Rustem Umerov

Rustem Umerov was appointed Minister of Defence on September 6, 2023. 

He was born in Uzbekistan on April 19, 1982, to a family in exile. He and his family relocated to Crimea, Ukraine, their native soil, when he was nine years old. 

From 2004 to 2019, he held various managerial positions in technology and investment companies operating within high technology and infrastructure sectors. 

For over 20 years, Rustem Umerov has been an adviser to the leader of the Crimean Tatar People, Mustafa Jemilev, and a delegate to the Qurultay (national congress) of the Crimean Tatar People. 
 

Following the occupation of Crimea in 2014, Umerov was involved in international advocacy for the liberation of temporarily occupied territories and for the release of Crimean political prisoners. 
In 2017, he facilitated the first release of two political prisoners of the kremlin. 

In 2019, Rustem Umerov was elected as a Member of the Parliament of Ukraine. Rustem Umerov held the position of the Secretary of the Parliament's Committee on Human Rights, Deoccupation and Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories, Ethnic Minorities, and Interethnic Relations. In 2020, he was elected Vice Chairman of the Permanent Delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. In the Parliament, he was a member of Inter-Parliamentary Friendship Groups with Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, the State of Israel, the People's Republic of China, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, the United States, Japan, and Canada. Umerov initiated the Crimean Platform parliamentary association in the Verkhovna Rada. 
He is also a Commissioner of the Advisory Council on Ukraine's Relations with Arab and Muslim States. 

In 2020, Rustem Umerov joined the group within the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, responsible for developing a state strategy for the deoccupation of Crimea and Sevastopol. 

In July 2022, he was elected by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine as the Chairman of the Temporary Investigative Commission on Monitoring the Receiving and Use of International Material and Technical Aid during the Period of Martial Law. 

As the full-scale invasion commenced, Umerov joined the Ukrainian delegation to participate in negotiations with the russian federation on preparing and approving a draft agreement on security guarantees for Ukraine. He was involved in the exchange of prisoners of war, political prisoners, children, and civilians, as well as in the evacuation of civilians from temporarily occupied territories. 

In September 2022, the Ukrainian Parliament appointed Umerov as the Chairman of the State Property Fund of Ukraine.