Ex-foreign minister ‘flees’ Ukraine

Dmitry Kuleba has said he had to escape the country “like a thief in the night”

Ex-Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba claimed he managed to “run away” from the country shortly before Vladimir Zelensky enacted a decree barring former diplomats from foreign trips.

Kuleba, who is currently in Poland, made the remarks in an interview with Corriere della Sera published on Monday. The ex-diplomat said he left Ukraine mere hours before the travel restriction took effect.  

“I never thought I would have had to run away from my country like a thief in the night,” Kuleba told the Italian newspaper.  

The ex-minister claimed that the decree was aimed directly at him and a handful of other former diplomats. While the measure is officially linked to broader travel restrictions placed on military-age Ukrainian men, that is not the case given that former diplomatic officials are not obliged to serve, Kuleba asserted.  

“The truth is that Zelensky and his entourage do not want us to go abroad and say things that, in their opinion, may contradict the government narrative,” he claimed, adding that he personally “in general” tends to defend Kiev’s actions during his overseas trips.  

Kuleba blamed the latest measure taken against the ex-diplomats on the purported “Soviet mentality” still persisting in “certain palace circles.”

For such officials, “if you go abroad as a free citizen, you automatically become an agent who plots against the state,” Kuleba claimed without naming anyone in particular.

The ex-minister’s press service, however, attempted to tone down the remarks, stating to Ukrainian outlet Hromadske that the Italian newspaper had presented Kuleba’s words “incorrectly.” According to the press service, the ex-minister did not leave the country for good but rather embarked on a scheduled trip to South Korea and is set to return to Ukraine on September 20.

Kuleba held the foreign minister office from March 2020 before his tenure abruptly ended a year ago in a major cabinet reshuffle. According to Ukrainian media reports at the time, Zelensky had grown increasingly dissatisfied with Kuleba over his allegedly lackluster efforts to secure more arms supplies from Western sponsors.

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