Scandals: Kyiv bans senior officials from vacationing abroad

Amid recent scandals involving key leaders and the Russian invasion, the Ukrainian government has banned all its senior officials and elected officials, including women, from vacationing abroad. Adopted on Friday, a government resolution to this effect “has already entered into force,” Ukrainian border guard spokesman Andriy Demchenko said on Monday. “They can only go on one mission now.”

Immediately after the start of the Russian invasion, which was launched on February 24, 2022, Ukraine banned men of military age (18-60) from traveling abroad, with rare exceptions where public officials require the authorization of their superiors.

With this new resolution, senior officers can only take their children on vacation abroad if they need medical treatment or the death of a loved one, detailed Andriï Demtchenko. According to the document published on the government’s official website, the ban also extends to female senior civil servants and representatives and local elected officials.

Member of Parliament Irina Gerashchenko condemned the “populist decision” on Facebook, which she said was “a sign of discrimination against thousands of Ukrainian women and their children”, adding that the country has 15,000 locally elected women. “First the government invited everyone who could come out with children for the winter and now they are banned from going out,” he lamented. “In a situation of war, it is important to protect the psychological health of women and their children.”

The government’s decision came after press reports emerged that an assistant attorney general had recently gone on holiday to the popular Spanish resort of Marbella. Oleksiï Symonenko was removed from office on January 25, as part of a series of dismissals initiated by President Volodymyr Zelensky following a corruption scandal involving military supplies.

Mykola Tichengo, a member of the Presidential Party, was also kicked out of the Presidential Party’s Parliamentary Committee on January 26 after a trip to Thailand. Finally, an influential media outlet on Friday accused former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko of vacationing in a luxury villa in the United Arab Emirates.