Three years ago, Volodymyr Zelensky was a comedian with little experience of politics.
Now, Ukraine’s president has emerged as a heroic war leader, whose brave defiance against Vladimir Putin has left fans swooning all over the world.
The actor-turned-politician has been hailed an icon for refusing to leave Kyiv, despite Russian forces hunting him down in a bid to overthrow his democratically-elected government.
Zelensky has rallied the nation with his moving addresses and video selfies standing up to Putin, who ordered his troops to invade Ukraine last week.For the latest updates on the Russia-Ukraine war, visit our live blog: Russia-Ukraine live
He is said to have cooly told his US counterpart Joe Biden ‘I need ammunition, not a ride’ when offered the chance to escape Ukraine’s capital city as it came under rocket fire.
It was an admirable act of bravery from a man with no political involvement before his landslide presidential victory in April 2019.
Before then, Zelensky’s only political role was in TV show ‘Servant of the People’, in which he played a history teacher who is unintentionally elected as the president after a video of his character giving an anti-corruption rant goes viral.
But life soon imitated art for Zelensky when, on New Year’s Eve in 2018, he upstaged the country’s then-leader Petro Poroshenko and announced on live TV that he would be running for president himself.
The following year he won the election with 73% of the vote.
Poroshenko, a pro-Russian billionaire, lost to the television star across all regions of the country, including in the west where he traditionally enjoyed strong support.
It was an extraordinary outcome to a campaign that started as a joke but struck a chord with voters enraged by poverty, corruption and a five-year war.
At his campaign HQ, as the exit polls came out, ever-defiant Zelensky said: ‘I will never let you down. While I am not formally president yet, as a citizen of Ukraine I can tell all post-Soviet countries: “Look at us! Everything is possible!”.’
Who is President Zelensky?
Zelensky was born in January 1978 in the large Russian-speaking city of Kryvyi Rih, in what was then the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.
His Jewish family bore the scars of the Nazi occupation of Ukraine, when more than one million Ukrainian Jewish people were killed in the Holocaust.
Zelensky’s grandfather fought in the Soviet Red Army against the Nazis in World War Two and was the only one of four brothers to survive the war.
Zelensky wanted to move to Israel after finishing school but his father refused to let him go, instead sending him to study law at
Kyiv National Economic University.
But it was comedy that captured his heart, and aged 17 he joined Ukraine’s KVN TV comedy league, forming his own team Kvartal 95.
After a few years of success that saw them travel to Moscow and a number of other ex-Soviet states, the Kvartal 95 comedy troupe founded its own production company, making films, cartoons and TV shows.
But Zelensky’s first big taste of fame came when he won his country’s version on Dancing with the Stars in 2006.
A now viral video of him jiving in a pink suit with flared trousers has left many wondering if there is anything he can’t do.
Zelensky grew up as a native Russian speaker but can also fluently speak English and Ukrainian.
He starred in a number of hit rom-coms during his acting career, and even did the voice over for Ukraine’s version of Paddington Bear.
He was already well-known by the time he was cast in Servant of the People in 2015. But this role changed his life forever, becoming hugely popular amidst Ukraine’s struggle with oligarchs and corruption.
Then in a stunning turn of events, Zelensky announced in 2018 that he planned to follow his character’s footsteps and run for president himself.
Like his on-screen persona, Zelensky and his new party – also called Servant of the People – bypassed the traditional campaign. He ran his presidential bid almost solely on social media, by continuing to tour with Kvartal 95 and mocking his opponents in viral videos.
His courage, good humour and grace has not wavered even in the face of the Russian invasion.
Zelensky’s defiant social media messages from the streets of central Kyiv have bolstered Ukraine’s fierce resistance, with civilians all over the country taking up arms and making Molotov cocktails to fight back against Putin.
Even foreigners are travelling to Ukraine to join the fight after Zelensky made a plea for volunteers to stop ‘Russian war criminals’.
His defiance against the odds have made him something of an unlikely sex symbol.
Admirers have been quick to compliment the father-of-two for his good looks and said his bravery had attracted them to him.
Some think he may just be the sexiest politician in the world, a title unofficially held by Canada’s prime minister Justin Trudeau.
One woman posted on her Twitter account this week: ‘Am I the only girl swooning for President Zelensky? His fearless passion is sooo hot.’
Another wrote online: ‘Sorry if this is inappropriate, but… I never noticed before – Zelensky is hot. Standing up to Russian aggression really brings out his eyes.’
One man said: ‘Zelensky was already the hottest world leader (close between him and [Canadian Prime Minister Justin] Trudeau). Homie is off the charts hot now.’
However, Zelensky has not always enjoyed such populairty,
His manifesto was mainly focused on ending corruption in politics and the war with Russian separatist forces in the Donbas region which broke out in 2014.
But after his landslide victory, Zelensky’s attempts to negotiate with Moscow to find a solution to the long-running conflict in the east of the country had only limited success, and last year his approval rating fell steadily.
His links with the billionaire Igor Kolomoisky, who owns a 70% stake in the TV channel 1+1 which aired Servant Of The People, have come under question.
And last year he faced another scandal when leaked papers showed he and two of his closest advisers had a network of offshore companies across the British Virgin Islands, Cyprus and Belize.
Zelensky had declared some of his interests before the election, but the investigation revealed he had transferred stakes to friends just weeks before he won to cover up his connections.
When the US warned in December of a potential full-scale invasion by Russia, Zelensky said the threat was exaggerated, and many doubted his ability to lead the country through the crisis as tensions flared.
But a big change in direction came with a speech to the West’s defence elites at the Munich Security Conference on February 19.
He began by describing a visit to a kindergarten in the east that had days earlier been hit by a missile.
Then he said: ‘When a bomb crater appears in a school playground, children have a question: “Has the world forgotten the mistakes of the 20th Century?”.’
Communications consultant Yaryna Klyuchkovska says no Ukrainian leader had spoken so bluntly to the West before.
Then, when Putin finally ordered his blitzkrieg, the leader stood firm.
In a series of sombre video messages, an exhausted Zelensky has sought to reassure his people that troops will keep on fighting and he will not abandon them.
On Friday — with his sharp presidential suits replaced by military khaki green — he released a sombre video pledging to defend his capital against foreign invasion.
In a self-shot video he said: ‘We’re all here. Our military is here. Citizens in society are here. We’re all here defending our independence, our country — and it will stay this way.’
In another video, looking weary but defiant, he shot down false claims from Russia that he had fled.
Zelensky told the world: ‘I am here. We are not putting down arms. We will be defending our country, because our weapon is truth, and our truth is that this is our land, our country, our children, and we will defend all of this. Glory to Ukraine.’
Many have compared his speeches to British wartime leader Winston Churchill.
In a moving, Churchillian speech on the day Russia invaded he said: ‘If we face an attempt to take away our country, our freedom, our lives, the lives of our children, we will defend ourselves. When you attack us, you will see our faces. Not our backs, but our faces.’
Afterwards, Olga Rudenko, chief editor of The Kyiv Independent — who had previously called Zelensky ‘dispiritingly mediocre’ — tweeted: ‘Today he is showing himself worthy of the nation he’s leading.’
Indeed, his refusal to cave into Russia has given other nations the confidence to dig their heels in.
The UK, US, EU and Canada have struck an agreement to remove certain Russian banks from global payments Swift and introduced sanctions against the central bank of Russia.
They have also supplied weapons and funds to Ukraine, with Germany sending anti-tank weapons and missiles in a major policy reversal.
The Germans had previously said it held ‘historical responsibilities’ that prevented it from providing arms in conflict areas.
All of this seemed inconceivable just a few weeks ago.
From a besieged Kyiv, Zelenskiy has been constantly on the phone to western leaders, using his Twitter feed to encourage, scold and praise his allies.
His defiance and resilience has left leaders all over the world impressed, perhaps none more so than Boris Johnson.
He has spoken to Zelensky nearly every day since the invasion and is said to have told his counterpart that ‘we are praying for you’.
Allies said that the premier ‘tends to leave God out of things’ but he was ‘very moved’.
Following a phone call on Friday morning he remarked: ‘Jesus, that guy is brave.’
It remains to be seen how the war in Ukraine will progress.
But as one leader’s office told The Guardian: ‘We are in awe of [Zelensky]. He may not eventually be able to save Ukraine, or change Russia, but he is changing Europe.’
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