Monastyrskyy, 42, was killed in a helicopter crash on the outskirts of Kiev while on his way to the front lines.
Ukraine’s Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskyy has was killed on Wednesday morning when the helicopter he was traveling in crashed near a kindergarten on the outskirts of Kiev.
Officials said the plane was flying towards frontline positions in eastern Ukraine when it crashed.
There was no immediate official statement on the cause of incident.
Monastyrskyy’s deputy Yevhen Yenin and Minister of State for Internal Affairs Yurii Lubkovych were also killed.
At least 14 people died, including those on the plane and a child on the ground, Ukraine’s emergency services said.
Monastyrskyy is in charge of the Ukrainian police and other emergency services. He is Ukraine’s highest casualty since Russia launched its invasion nearly a year ago.
Here’s what you need to know:
- Monastyrskyy was born in the city of Khmelnytskyi, western Ukraine, on June 12, 1980. By that time, the city and Ukraine had formed a more extensive part of the Soviet Union.
- He died on the morning of January 18, at the age of 42.
- Patrick Bury, a senior lecturer in security at the UK’s University of Bath and a former NATO analyst, said the home secretary’s death would be a “significant blow” to Ukraine and the world. leader of this country.
- Bury told Al Jazeera: “He was the first secretary to run a ministry on a daily basis that was killed in the war, so basically some Ukrainians are saying this is like losing the head of the ministry by degree. beheading”.
- Monastyrskyy graduated from the Khmelnytsky Regional Institute of Law and Management in 2002, before starting a career as a lawyer.
- In 2003, Monastyrskyy assumed the role of assistant advisor to a member of the Ukrainian parliament. In 2016, he joined the Future of Ukraine Institute, an independent consulting organization.
- Monastyrskyy has been working as a consultant for three years, studying reform issues related to the country’s legal system.
- In 2019, he joined the campaign team for then-presidential candidate Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
- Two months after Zelenskyy was elected president in May 2019, Monastyrskyy was elected a member of Ukraine’s parliament.
- A member of Zelenskyy’s Servant of the People party, he served as chairman of the parliamentary committee on law enforcement.
- Monastyrskyy was appointed Ukraine’s interior minister in July 2021, six months before Russia launched the invasion.
- As interior minister, he was in charge of the Ukrainian police and other emergency services. In the months following the invasion of Moscow in February 2022, Monastyrskyy regularly updated the Ukrainian public on casualties caused by Russian attacks.
- On Wednesday, Zelenskyy hailed Monastyrskyy as a “true patriot” and said his death and the loss of others in the helicopter crash was a “terrible tragedy.” “causes “unspeakable” pain.
- Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal echoed Zelenskyy’s message and described Monastyrskyy’s death as a “great loss” for the Ukrainian government.
