Ukrainian interior minister resigns after "drunken brawl"

Posted By Joshua Keating Wednesday, May 13, 2009 - 10:59 AM Share

Taking a page from former Japanese finance minister Shoichi Nakagawa's playbook, Ukrainian Interior Minister Yuri Lutsenko ended his political career in humiliating fashion this week after after a public drunkenness incident. Allegedly, Lutsenko and his teenage son had a few too many at the Frankfurt airport and then got into a fight with some cops. Lutsenko says he only had a beer and just got angry when the police handcuffed his son. He is threatening to sue the German tabloid Bild for libel.

In any event, Lutsenko offered his resignation yesterday, leaving Yulia Tymoshenko's already embattled government without an interior minister, a foreign minister, or a finance minister. Not a particularly welcome development given the scale of the economic and political challenges they're facing.

This incident combined with Nakagawa's downfall could be a warning to government ministers to take it easy on the booze while traveling on official business, but somehow I doubt it.

SERGEI SUPINSKY/AFP/Getty Images

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12:54 AM ET

May 14, 2009

Government officials should

Government officials should be very cautious in their public activities because people are really eyeing for them especially the media men. When you are voted by the people, expect a very big expectation from them as they rely their trust and confidence in you. So act as if everybody is looking at you always.

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