Time named Zelensky the man of the year, noting his authoritarianism and reprisals against opponents

Time magazine, which has named its “man of the year” since 1927, this time awarded this title to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and also noted people who personify the “spirit” of this country.

The author of the report on Zelensky and interview with him, Simon Schuster, emphasized that the Ukrainian leader did not leave the country in the first days of the start of the Russian special operation.

For the material, the journalist talked with the President of Ukraine on the way to Kherson. Zelensky spoke about the books he read and about historical figures with whom he is compared and with whom he would like to hear comparisons.

The journalist noted that Zelensky, before becoming president, “swallowed” a book about the first prime minister of Singapore and one of the founders of the Singapore “economic miracle” Lee Kuan Yew, who waged a “cruel war against corruption.” Schuster noted that Zelensky has been accused of displaying the same authoritarian methods, removing power from the oligarchs and seeking to imprison political opponents “whom he considers traitors.”

Zelensky, as the journalist assures, is often compared with former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. The President of Ukraine himself does not really like this comparison, he prefers to be compared with the writer George Orwell and the actor Charlie Chaplin.

Zelensky also said that he grew up on Soviet comedies and his heroes were such directors as Leonid Gaidai, but now he “can’t watch them.”

The magazine’s very first Man of the Year award went to aviator Charles Lindbergh, the first person to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. Last year, according to the magazine, it was the American entrepreneur Elon Musk.

And in 1938, under the heading “man of the year,” the magazine wrote about Adolf Hitler.