Senior US diplomat at centre of pro-Kremlin conspiracy theories to step down

A senior official at the US State Department who was heavily involved in US-Ukraine policy and earned Moscow’s wrath as a result is stepping down in the coming weeks, said Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

Victoria Nuland was the agency’s Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs and previously served as assistant Secretary of State for Europe; in both positions, she was a fervent advocate for US support of Ukraine while drawing from her deep professional history of working in Russia.

Ms Nuland departed from the State Department when Donald Trump took office in 2017 but returned under his successor Joe Biden.

In a statement, the secretary of State wrote that Ms Nuland’s “leadership on Ukraine” will be a decision which “diplomats and students of foreign policy will study for years to come”.

“Her efforts have been indispensable to confronting Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, marshalling a global coalition to ensure his strategic failure, and helping Ukraine work toward the day when it will be able to stand strongly on its own feet – democratically, economically, and militarily,” said Mr Blinken.

In both Moscow and pro-Trump circles in the United States, Ms Nuland has long been accused of being the orchestrator of the 2014 protests in Ukraine which resulted in the ousting of the country’s pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych.

In reality, Mr Yanukovych’s ouster was the result of months of protests which began after he rejected a major agreement with the European Union in a bid for closer ties with Russia. His removal from office was followed by Russia invading and annexing Ukrainian territory, and Mr Yanukovych fleeing to Russian territory.

Her departure was celebrated by one of the architects of the cloud