War veterans appointed leaders of Kola navy towns
Artur Li, a highly decorated medic from the war of aggression against Ukraine, has been appointed the new head of the naval bastion Aleksandrovsk. He is the second war veteran to be designated leader of a naval town on the Kola Peninsula.
Artur Li comes from Gadzhievo, a town that houses Russia’s 31st Submarine Division, and has worked for years as a military doctor.
He holds the rank of lieutenant-colonel and, until recently, headed the Naval Clinical Hospital in the naval base of Zaozersk. Following the start of Russia’s full-scale war of aggression against Ukraine, Li went to serve on occupied land, where he was reportedly injured. Upon his return to the Kola Peninsula, he enrolled in regional Governor Andrei Chibis’ trainee programme for war veterans, the so-called "Heroes of the North" programme.
On 11 November, the 43-year-old medic was appointed the new Head of Aleksandrovsk, a municipality that includes several of Russia’s most potent naval bases, among them Polyarny, Gadzhievo, Snezhnogorsk, and Olenya Guba.
Governor Chibis has been a strong proponent of Li’s candidacy for the post in Aleksandrovsk.
"Professionals such as Artur Li are a source of pride for the Kola Arctic. The ‘Heroes of the North’ programme has proven its effectiveness: participants in the special vocational education programme are acquiring new management skills and successfully applying them for the benefit of the Murmansk region," Chibis said in a meeting with Li earlier this month.
The appointment of Li comes a few months after Yaroslav Melnik, another war veteran, was appointed leader of Zaozersk, a nearby naval base.
Veterans of the war of aggression are also being appointed to other key posts in the region. The newly elected Murmansk Regional Duma includes four veterans, among them two so-called "Heroes of Russia."
One of them, Ivan Khrustalyev, was subsequently appointed senator for the Murmansk region in the upper house of parliament, the Federation Council.
Khrustalev, 32, signed a contract with the Ministry of Defence in 2018 and joined the 80th Separate Motorised Rifle Brigade (Arctic) in Alakurtti, Murmansk region, the Russian-language version of the Barents Observer reported.
He joined the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in March 2022.
