Ban on leaving Ukraine extends to officials unfit for service

The recently passed ban on the exit from the country of Ukrainian civil servants, in addition to business trips, also applies to persons who are unfit for military service, Andriy Demchenko, spokesperson of the State Border Service, said on Jan. 29.

The ban concerns both men and women, Demchenko said.

Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council has banned state officials from leaving the country during martial law, except for official business trips, President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening address on Jan. 23.

Under martial law, Ukrainian men aged 18 to 60 are banned from leaving the country during the war except when they obtain special permits from the government.

Some Ukrainian state officials and businesspeople have routinely violated this system and bypassed the restrictions.

The ban on state officials’ travel abroad follows a scandal surrounding Oleksiy Symoneko, a deputy prosecutor general.

Symonenko went for a vacation to Spain in December-January using a Mercedes car owned by Lviv-based businessman Grigory Kozlovsky, according to an investigation by the online newspaper Ukrainska Pravda.

Symonenko has a shady background and faces accusations of blocking corruption cases.

The official also reportedly helped dismiss a bribery case against Zelensky’s deputy chief of staff, Oleh Tatarov, signing an order to transfer it from the independent National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine to the presidentially controlled Security Service of Ukraine.

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The Kyiv Independent