On 13 December 2018, the Council of Europe delegation participated in a meeting with the Minister of Justice of Ukraine, Mr Pavlo Petrenko, and Deputy Minister of Justice of Ukraine – Agent before the European Court of Human Rights, Mr Ivan Lishchyna. The meeting was organised in the framework of the Council of Europe project “Supporting Ukraine in execution of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights” (the Project) which is funded by the Human Rights Trust Fund and implemented by the Justice and Legal Co-operation Department of the Council of Europe.
The Council of Europe was represented by: Ms Hanne Juncher, Head of the Justice and Legal Co-operation Department of the Council of Europe, Mr Fredrik Sundberg, Acting Head of the Department for the execution of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights of the Council of Europe, Mr Mårten Ehnberg, Head of the Council of Europe Office in Ukraine, and Ms Inna Liniova, Officer of the Project.
The meeting was dedicated to the execution by Ukraine of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (the ECtHR) in cases “Yuriy Nikolayevich Ivanov v. Ukraine” and “Burmych and others v. Ukraine” and to ensuring enforcement of national judgments delivered against state authorities and enterprises. The parties have agreed with regard to the following:
- the adoption by the Ukrainian Parliament of the Draft Law no 8533 of 27.06.2018 on amendments to certain legislative acts of Ukraine aimed at tackling the problem of the state debt which occurred based on judicial decisions that would facilitate the process of execution of Ivanov/Burmych judgments. The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe emphasised the importance of this Draft Law in its decision adopted at the 1331st meeting on 4 – 6 December 2018 with regard to the group of ECtHR judgments in question[1];
- for the full execution of the Ivanov/Burmych group, Ukraine has to undertake the necessary general measures, that is to analyse non-enforced judicial decisions against the state, to identify the flaws of the legislation and practices hampering enforcement (“the root causes of non-enforcement”), and to prepare – at a high political level and in co-operation with all branches of state power – the strategy of elimination of the identified flaws;
- order to prevent a similar situation from re-occurring, it might be useful to: (i) look into the legislative process, and to ensure that this process is based on financial and economic forecasts of adoption of each legislative piece, and (ii) to ensure automatic audit of current judicial decisions that are being delivered against the state.
The Ministry of Justice of Ukraine and the Council of Europe confirmed their willingness to continue their co-operation in ensuring the full execution of the Ivanov/Burmych judgments.
WEB LINKS TO THE EVENT
Ministry of Justice of Ukraine
