Sole Putin aide to openly oppose invasion of Ukraine reportedly resigns after being sidelined

A deputy head of Russia’s Presidential Administration, Dmitry Kozak, has resigned from his position, Russian news outlet RBC reported on Wednesday, citing two Kremlin sources familiar with the matter.

Kozak, a close ally of Vladimir Putin who was deputy prime minister of Russia for 11 years before taking up his post in the Presidential Administration in 2020, plans to leave the Kremlin for good for unspecified business opportunities, according to RBC.

Political scientist Arkady Dubnov, who first reported the news, described Kozak as being “burdened with his involvement in what was happening” and said that he had “considered it necessary to leave” the Kremlin despite having been promised that he would be appointed Putin’s representative to the North-Western Federal District.

Kozak is most notable for having argued against the invasion of Ukraine during a key meeting of Russia’s Security Council in early 2022, according to Dubnov, who said Kozak was the only member of the council to do so, making a 40-minute speech that was subsequently expunged from the meeting’s official transcript warning of the negative consequences the invasion would have for the country.

Since leading the initial and ultimately unsuccessful peace negotiations with Ukraine, Kozak has since proposed various reforms to Putin, all of which were rejected. His opposition to the war in Ukraine is widely seen to have been instrumental in the waning of his Kremlin influence, however, with The New York Times reporting last month that much of Kozak’s power and responsibility had shifted to fellow deputy head of the Presidential Administration, Sergey Kiriyenko.