Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been named TIME’s person of the year, alongside the “spirit of Ukraine.”
The magazine revealed its choice on Wednesday as it tweeted the front page of a special edition featuring the leader, saying he inspired Ukrainians and won global accolades for his courage in resisting Russia’s devastating invasion.
TIME's 2022 Person of the Year: Volodymyr Zelensky and the spirit of Ukraine #TIMEPOY https://t.co/06Y5fuc0fG pic.twitter.com/i8ZT3d5GDa
— TIME (@TIME) December 7, 2022
Refusing to leave Ukraine‘s capital of Kyiv at the outbreak of the war as Russian bombs rained down, the former comedian rallied his compatriots in broadcasts from the capital and traveled across his war-torn nation, the publication noted in bestowing its annual title.
On Tuesday, Mr Zelensky visited Ukrainian troops near the front lines in eastern Ukraine.
Acknowledging the 44-year-old leader, TIME wrote: “Zelensky’s success as a wartime leader has relied on the fact that courage is contagious.
“It spread through Ukraine’s political leadership in the first days of the invasion, as everyone realized the president had stuck around.”
Mr Zelensky became President in 2019, and has been in office throughout Russia’s war against Ukraine, which began in February.
He grew up in the Dnipropetrovsk Oblast of central Ukraine and studied at the Kyiv National Economic University, before pursuing a career in comedy and acting, including in hugely popular TV series Servant of the People in which he played the President of Ukraine.
He won the election in 2019 with more than 73 per cent of the vote.
Mr Zelensky joins a long line of politicians to have been selected TIME’s ‘Person of the Year’, including Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Donald Trump, Angela Merkel, Barack Obama, and Vladimir Putin - the latter of whom was selected in 2007.
Tesla Inc Chief Executive Officer Elon Musk was named Time‘s ‘Person of the Year’ in 2021, a year that saw his electric car company become the most valuable carmaker in the world. TIME began the tradition of selecting a ‘Person of the Year’ in 1927.
