Russian military forces have installed a new mayor for the embattled city of Melitopol — one day after its elected mayor was kidnapped by a group of 10 Russian soldiers.
Galina Danilchenko, a former member of the city council, was proclaimed the acting mayor on local TV Saturday, CNN reported.
Mayor Ivan Fedorov was taken from Melitopol’s crisis center Friday with a plastic bag over his head after he “refused to cooperate with the enemy,” Ukraine’s parliament said.
More than 2,000 residents of the Russian-occupied city in the Kremlin-backed rebel region of Luhansk staged a rally to support Fedorov Saturday, while Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky demanded his immediate release.
But in a televised statement, Danilchenko said she aimed to get the city “back to normal” and warned against those who would “provoke a reaction of bad behavior.”
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“I ask you to keep your wits about you and not to give in to these provocations,” she said.
