UPDATE 1-Russian paratrooper commander Teplinsky to head army group in Ukraine - TASS cites source

(Adds context, background on Teplinsky from paragraph three onwards)

MOSCOW, Oct 30 (Reuters) - The commander of Russia's airborne forces, Colonel General Mikhail Teplinsky, has been named as the new commander of Russia's Dnipro military group in Ukraine, the state-run TASS news agency reported on Monday, citing a source.

Teplinsky replaces Colonel General Oleg Makarevich, the newspaper Izvestia reported separately.

Russia's armed forces are divided into around half a dozen groups. The popular military blogger 'Operation Z' said the Dnipro group was deployed in southern Ukraine, where the U.S.-based Institute for the Study of War said on Oct. 19 that Ukrainian forces appeared to have broken through Russian lines on the left, southern bank of the Dnipro River.

Russia said it had foiled attempts to cross the river, however.

Teplinsky was appointed in June 2022 to head the elite airborne forces, which had suffered heavy casualties in the earliest days of the war in Ukraine.

British military intelligence said he was dismissed from a senior role in Ukraine in January, but later reinstated. It said he was likely to be one of the few senior generals "widely respected by the rank-and-file".

In April, Teplinsky was shown on video meeting President Vladimir Putin.

Some Russian sources had suggested that Teplinsky's position was in danger after the Wagner mercenary group staged a brief mutiny in June, took control of the southern city of Rostov and advanced largely unopposed towards Moscow before reaching an agreement with the Kremlin to stand down.

On Aug. 2, Teplinsky made a speech to members and veterans of the airborne service in honour of Paratroopers' Day, in which he said at least 8,500 paratroopers had been wounded in Ukraine.

A clip from the speech was published by the defence ministry news outlet Zvezda, but removed within hours for reasons that were unclear.

Born on Jan. 9, 1969 in Soviet Ukraine, in the now war-torn Donetsk region, Teplinsky served with Russian forces in Moldova's Russian-speaking breakaway region of Transdniestria after the Soviet Union broke up.

He fought in two wars in Chechnya, where Russia crushed an Islamist insurgency, and took part in Russian military operations in support of President Bashar al-Assad during Syria's civil war. (Reporting by Reuters; Writing by Mark Trevelyan and Kevin Liffey; Editing by Andrew Osborn)