The Ministry of Defense of Russia announced today the relief of general Mikhail Mizintsevknown in the West as the “Mariupol Butcher”, as Vice Minister in charge of Procurement. The tasks of supply and technical-material provisioning will now be carried out by the general colonel Alexei Kuzmenkov, until now number two of the National Guard, says the statement from the Ministry of Defense.
The revocation of Mizintsev comes after Russian President Vladimir Putin will visit the port of Mariupol in the Donetsk region in March, his first visit to the occupied territories in Ukraine.
Mizintsev had taken office last September after commanding the brutal siege of the port of Mariupol, whose seizure in May 2022 was key to building the corridor between Russia and the annexed Crimean peninsula along the Azov Sea. For this reason, the Russian general, who also held positions of responsibility in the Russian military intervention in Syria, has been sanctioned by the West.
The “butcher of MAriupol”, 60 years old, held one of the highest military posts in Russia and reported directly to Putin. Also controlled a good part of the hackers in the army working on Astra Linux and Rusbitech systems.
Mizintsev was born during the height of the power of the Soviet Union, in a town located about 650 kilometers from Moscow. He studied at the kyiv Higher Combined Arms Command School before becoming a commander of a reconnaissance platoon of the Soviet Army in East Germanythe same region in which Putin operated as a KGB agent.
After the fall of the Soviet Union, Mizintsev was deployed in the Caucasus to command a motorized rifle battalion.
His return to Moscow in the late 1990s led to a rapid rise, culminating in a 2003 posting as head of the operations directorate of the chief of the General Staffa function that entrusted him with military planning tasks, according to information from foxnews.
Once the news of his dismissal broke, the head of the Wagner mercenaries, Yevgueni Prigozhin, invited Mizintseva to become part of the leadership of the group.
The horror of Mariupol
Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelensky assured that more than 90% of the city of Mariupol has been destroyed. “Almost half a million people used to live there. And now there is practically no house left intact,” Zelensky said in a message posted on his social networks along with a video comparing satellite images from 2021 and 2023.
In these shots, obtained from google maps After this service updated its images of Mariupol for the first time since the start of the Russian campaign, entire blocks of buildings can be seen disappearing as of mid-March 2022.
“The Russian terrorist state did everything possible to wipe out this city. More than 90% of Mariupol has been destroyed, ”he stressed.
Some military bloggers have warned of infighting within the Russian Defense Ministry due to the lack of progress on the front.
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Source-www.infobae.com