Just as peace talks were gaining momentum, Ukraine lost its chief negotiator.
Andriy Yermak, an ever-present figure at President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s side during the war with Russia, resigned as chief of staff on Friday after an anti-corruption raid on his home, injecting new uncertainty into Ukraine’s leadership.
The departure leaves a vacuum around Zelenskyy as talks accelerate, isolating the Ukrainian president at a critical moment and creating an opening that Moscow could try to exploit, analysts say.
The development capped a dramatic week, which began with kyiv under intense pressure from President Donald Trump to back a plan that aligned with Moscow’s hardline demands. The initial Thursday deadline, imposed by the White House, passed without any announcement, as Ukraine and its allies rejected calls for the country to cede territory.
Ukrainian negotiators, led by Yermak, achieved changes and Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, will now head to Moscow for talks next week with Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday that Russia still wants to move toward peace despite believing Zelenskyy was not a legitimate leader.
But analysts warn that Yermak’s departure leaves kyiv navigating uncharted waters as Zelenskyy is forced to guide Ukraine through high-stakes negotiations without his most trusted aide.
Yermak’s resignation comes at a “very bad time, because we really are at a potential tipping point where you know that what Ukraine is demanding may not be granted or taken into consideration,” Michael Bociurkiw, a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center, told NBC News by phone on Saturday.
“None of us really know what Zelenskyy is like operating alone, because he’s never done it,” he said, adding that Yermak has “basically replaced” Zelenskyy at times.
Rustem Umerov, secretary of the National Security and Defense Council, will lead Ukraine’s delegation to a round of talks in the United States on Sunday, Zelenskyy said in a post on X. Umerov has also been mentioned by anti-corruption investigators. Neither he nor Yermak have faced charges.
Bociurkiw added that Yermak’s departure is unlikely to change Ukraine’s firm stance on territorial concessions, but that Russia “will try to manipulate and take advantage of this vacuum.”
Secretary Marco Rubio, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and the president’s son-in-law Jared Kushner will attend Sunday’s talks, a U.S. official told NBC News.
Michael A. Horowitz, a Jerusalem-based geopolitical consultant, echoed Bociurkiw’s concerns and said that Yermak’s resignation, just days before important talks between the United States, Ukraine and Russia and a possible Trump-Putin summit, “disrupts kyiv’s preparations and invites its counterparts to investigate whether Ukraine’s red lines in territory and NATO can be softened during the transition.”
But in the long term, Horowitz told NBC News on Saturday, Yermak’s departure could even be positive.
Critics have said for years that Yermak had amassed too much power and exerted too much influence over Zelenskyy. A constant presence at the president’s side during the ups and downs of the war, Yermak had become one of the few men the Ukrainian leader seemed to truly trust.
Zelenskyy has previously criticized corrupt officials, but signs that a corruption scandal may have spread to his inner circle may provide more ammunition to critics of greater support for Ukraine. Trump-aligned figures, including Vice President JD Vance, have previously criticized Ukraine for its corruption problems.
Yermak’s departure may “reinforce skepticism within the Trump administration” about Zelenskyy’s inner circle, giving them more reason to push for concessions, said Natia Seskuria, an associate fellow at the Royal United Services Institute, a London-based think tank.
But Horowitz said the resignation “removes a lightning rod of controversy and gives kyiv a cleaner, more collective mandate to say no to an unjust and unsustainable peace,” adding: “Zelenskyy is putting his house in order.”
When it comes to how the rule of law is being applied in Ukraine, “overall, this is a good sign,” said Moritz Brake, senior researcher at the Center for Advanced Security, Strategic and Integration Studies.
“Of course, it is bad enough that these accusations existed in the first place,” he added, but “even those in the highest positions are prosecuted when suspicions arise.”
Zelenskyy said in a video statement on Friday that he was looking for a replacement for Yermak. “Russia really wants Ukraine to make mistakes,” he said. “There will be no mistakes on our part.”
Losing unity could mean losing the country and its future, he added.
But Bociurkiw said time “is not on Ukraine’s side at the moment.”
If you are Ukraine right now, he added, “you need not just a physical army, but an army of diplomats and defenders.”
