As anti-police protests escalate across the country and the public demands the resignation of Interior Minister Vitaliy Zakharchenko, the top cop announced he would be taking a month-long holiday beginning on July 15.
The latest wave of protests started after a gang rape that involved
police officers in southern Mykolaiv Oblast in June, and an attempted
cover-up that followed. After that a number of other protests against
police brutality bubbled up in Ivano-Frankivsk, Fastiv and Kyiv,
indicating that anger against the police has reached a critical point.
But on July 18, Zakharchenko returned to work and said his absence was
due to a business trip he had to take, not a vacation.
