Denys Monastyrskyi

Denys Anatoliiovych Monastyrsky (, ; 12 June 1980 – 18 January 2023) was a Ukrainian lawyer and politician who served as Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine from 16 July 2021 until his death in a helicopter crash on 18 January 2023. He had been very close to Volodymyr Zelenskyy since the beginning of his presidential campaign.

Biography Denys Monastyrsky was born in Khmelnytskyi, then in the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic of the Soviet Union, on 12 June 1980.

In 2007, Monastyrsky started his career as a lawyer. Zelenskyy won the election and was inaugurated as President of Ukraine on 20 May 2019.

Monastyrsky was a candidate for Servant of the People in the 2019 Ukrainian parliamentary election.

In parliament, he became head of the parliamentary Committee on Law Enforcement Affairs. Monastyrsky was appointed Minister of Internal Affairs by 271 MPs on 16 July 2021.

In September 2022, Monastyrsky participated in the largest prisoner exchange operation between Ukraine and Russia, when 215 Ukrainian soldiers returned home, including more than 100 fighters and commanders of the Azov Regiment.

Throughout the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Monastyrsky was among the top security officials who remained in Kyiv, the capital, with Zelenskyy in the first days of the war as Russia's army bore down on the city. As Ukraine's minister for internal affairs, he helped shape Ukraine's wartime goals and oversaw the country's National Police, State Emergency Service and the State Border Guard Service. The Security Service of Ukraine has started an investigation into the cause of the crash in Brovary.

Monastyrsky was buried on 21 January 2023 at the Baikove Cemetery in Kyiv.

Awards Order of Merit, 3rd class (2022).