Vladimir Putin has appointed State Duma Deputy Alexander Khinshtein as the new acting governor of Russia’s southwestern Kursk region citing the need for “crisis management” amid the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU)’s continued partial occupation of the area, the Kremlin announced on Thursday.
In a meeting earlier in the day, Putin told Khinshtein that he would have “much to do in terms of restoring housing and communal services” as well as “rebuilding the region’s economy”, once Russian forces in the embattled border region “liberated” occupied areas of Kursk “from the enemy”.
He also encouraged Khinshtein, who previously served as an advisor to the director of Russia’s National Guard, to draw on his work with law enforcement agencies and his “good relationships within executive authorities” to solve the region’s problems.
Khinshtein pledged to do all he could to ensure Kursk residents felt they were “part of our large, united country” before writing on Telegram that he would soon be heading to Kursk to begin his work in the “challenging” region.
“There is no greater happiness than serving our country, our people, and our president”, Khinshtein said.
One of the architects of Russia’s ban on “LGBT propaganda”, Khinshtein has gained notoriety in recent months for his homophobic campaign to out gay public servants in the Samara region, where he served as Duma deputy.
Khinstein replaces Kursk’s previous acting Governor Alexey Smirnov, who, despite being re-elected with 65% of the vote in September’s gubernatorial elections, ultimately only managed to hold the post for 205 days amid widespread fury from residents of the region’s AFU-occupied border districts at the regional administration’s failure to evacuate civilians.
According to the Kremlin, over 112,000 people have been evacuated from the Kursk region since the AFU began its military incursion into the area on 6 August, with the heads of two border districts fired in November following protests by internally displaced residents.