Ukraine’s Democracy in Darkness

Nayyem was born in Kabul in 1981, the second year of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. His mother died three years later, after giving birth to his brother, Masi. When Soviet troops withdrew from Afghanistan, in 1989, Nayyem’s father, a former government official, moved to Moscow. Two years later, after marrying a Ukrainian woman, he moved the family to Kyiv. Nayyem rose to prominence in his twenties as a crusading journalist, uncovering stories of top-level government graft in Ukraine. Following the Revolution of Dignity, he served in parliament and played a key role in reforming Ukraine’s notoriously corrupt and violent police force. Before accepting his current job, he was a deputy minister for infrastructure.