Kyiv mayor says political foes trying to discredit and oust him

By Olena Harmash

KYIV (Reuters) - Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko accused opponents of waging a campaign to discredit him and force him out of office on Wednesday following a rift with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

The former boxing champion's political future is uncertain after a public outcry over the deaths of three people locked out of an air raid shelter during a Russian attack on Kyiv this month.

An audit ordered by Zelenskiy found only 15% of Kyiv's 4,655 bomb shelters were suitable and only 44% were freely accessible, and prosecutors on Tuesday served a formal "notice of suspicion" to a senior Kyiv security official accused of mismanagement.

Klitschko posted a video message on the Telegram messaging app in which he appeared to criticise investigations over the situation with the shelters, decrying "endless searches" that were making it hard to run the capital efficiently.

"Today there is a heavy campaign to discredit the capital authorities and personally me. In wartime, they bring chaos to the management of the capital," said Klitschko, standing in front of the Ukrainian flag and a Kyiv landscape.

Klitschko, who did not mention Zelenskiy, criticised the prosecutors' decision to put the head of Kyiv's municipal department for security under house arrest following the audit, and said it was too early for political battles while Ukraine was still fighting Russian forces.

"Are we talking about being objective and about the absence of political motives? Have we won yet? There are no other challenges, the main problem is Klitschko!? And someone is itching to take control of the capital again," he said.

Klitschko, now in his ninth year as mayor, was seen as one of Zelenskiy's highest-profile opponents before Russia began its war in Ukraine last year. They had a public spat in November when Zelenskiy accused Klitschko of doing a poor job setting up emergency shelters to help people with power and heat.

After the bomb shelter incident, Klitschko said he bore some responsibility but that others were to blame, especially appointees of the president.

(Reporting by Olena Harmash, editing by Timothy Heritage)