The future Russian defense minister Andrei Belousov will to be Putin's puppet, said his British colleague Grant Shapps, reported DPA and BTA.
Yesterday, Putin surprisingly proposed the economist Belousov, who until now served as the first deputy prime minister in the government, as the new minister of defense in place of Sergei Shoigu.
Shoigu has come under considerable criticism for the effectiveness of the Russian military in Ukraine, even more than two years after the conflict began.
Shapns predicts that Belousov will be Putin's next puppet. Under Shoigu, the Russian army lost over 355,000 soldiers in Ukraine and caused massive suffering to the civilian population during its illegal campaign in Ukraine, he added, quoted by BTA.