Russian president Dmitry Medvedev has dismissed a close ally of prime minister Vladimir Putin as head of a state arms agency, the Kremlin said on Sunday without giving a reason.
Medvedev, who has made tentative moves to assert his independence from Putin in recent months, signed an order to dismiss Viktor Cherkesov as head of the Federal Arms Procurement Agency, the Kremlin said in a statement.
Cherkesov was deputy head of the FSB, the main successor organisation to the KGB, in the late 1990s when Putin led the service.
But in 2007 Putin publicly scolded Cherkesov, then head of the state anti-drugs service, for publicising a feud with the FSB in an open letter.
Cherkesov was appointed head of the arms procurement agency in May 2008.
