A DESPERATE Vladimir Putin has now appointed his COUSIN with zero military experience as the new defence minister of Russia.
The tyrant today handed over the command to niece Anna Tsivileva, 52, after ruthlessly sacking top ministers in a major shakeup.
In the latest blow to the Russian war administration, Putin fired deputy defence ministers Nikolai Pankov, Ruslan Tsalikov, Tatiana Shevtsova and Pavel Popov.
They led the ministry after the despot removed his long-standing ally Sergei Shoigu last month.
It is understood that Anna, the daughter of Putin's late cousin Yevgeny Putin, will now look after Russia's defence and will be responsible for improving social and housing support for military personnel.
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She is married to Sergei Tsivilev who recently serves as the Energy Minister in Putin’s regime.
She was appointed as one of several deputy defence ministers as Putin after Shoigu's sacking - and is set to work under Andrey Belousov, another top Putin crony.
A psychologist by education, Anna has headed Defenders of the Fatherland, a group set up to "help" participants in the Russia-Ukraine war.
So far, the group, set up by Putin amid his illegal war against Ukraine, has raised some £89millions, The Times reports.
In 2022, Tsivileva was sanctioned by the UK government over her links to Putin.
Putin also appointed Pavel Fradkov, son of former Prime Minister and spy chief Mikhail Fradkov, as his first deputy chief of presidential affairs.
Meanwhile, a bombshell claim suggests that Putin could be grooming his alleged secret nine-year-old son for power as he plots a dynastic succession.
He is rumoured to also want to bring his two elder daughters into power imminently to act as potential “regents” if his health fails.
Putin is said to want to carry on ruling Russia until his undisclosed and hidden son, Ivan, turns 18 and he hands him the Kremlin reins as the country's new tsar.
This would involve changing the Russian constitution - which Putin has had no trouble editing before - which dictates a president must be older than 35.
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The strange allegation comes from a Russian lawyer, ex-MP and political pundit Mark Feigin, 52, who once represented the iconic anti-Putin punk band Pussy Riot.
Speaking to Ukrainian TV host Dmitry Gordon, who last week quizzed Boris Johnson in Kyiv, claimed that Putin has two young sons with his long-term gymnast mistress Alina Kabaeva, 40.
The paranoid and private ageing ruler only publicly claims his two high-flying with his first wife - but is rumoured to have at least six children.
The despot's older alleged secret son, Ivan, is believed to be nine and already being primed for the presidency.
He is long rumoured to have been born in an exclusive private clinic in Switzerland.
The other - Vladimir Junior - was reportedly born four years later in Moscow in 2019, with the same Swiss-based Soviet-born doctor Dr Natalia Thiebaud Kondratieva, 63, in charge of the delivery.
RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR
Russia has seen its two bloodiest days of the meatgrinder war back to back after losing more than 2,500 men in just 48 hours.
The rampant rise in fatalities comes after the approval by Western countries for Ukraine to launch an armed attack within Russia.
Kyiv says Russian casualty figures have been above 1,000 per day since Moscow launched a new offensive in Kharkiv on May 10.
Ukrainian forces are now said to have killed 512,420 Russian troops and destroyed 7,794 tanks, 15,020 armoured combat vehicles, and 13,345 artillery pieces since the start of the war.
A humiliated Putin has now acknowledged that thousands of Russian soldiers are dying in Ukraine each month in a shame-faced admission.
Kyiv has been rampantly using US-made ATACMS rockets to blitz targets inside Russia.
A series of deadly missiles were launched at Putin-occupied Luhansk as loud explosions rang out in the city, causing panic.
ATAMC rockets are fitted with a 500lb warhead and can reach targets 300km away in just five minutes.
The killer 2,300mph missiles give Ukraine nearly double the striking distance it had with the mid-range version of the weapon it received from the US last October.
The US has also been supplying HIMARS missiles to the front which were deployed to destroy Putin's S300 launchers.
Dramatic footage showed the HIMARS blasting key military targets and reportedly obliterating up to three of Moscow's S300 rockets which the warmonger used in Kharkiv.
In response, the despot threatened to send his allies long-range missiles to counter the West's decision to allow his enemies to use lethal weapons against his troops on the frontlines.
