Members of the Ukrainian Parliament and Ombudsperson’s Office took part in the expert meetings in Strasbourg on 30-31 January 2020 aimed at discussing the concepts and practical steps for development and adoption of the new Law of Ukraine on Personal Data Protection. Members of Ukrainian delegation presented their vision for reform of the data protection sphere and the Council of Europe representatives and experts highlighted the key human rights issues to consider in the process of drafting the new legislation.
Reform of the data protection legislative framework aimed at bringing it in compliance with the requirements of the General Data Protection Regulation of the European Union is one of the obligations of Ukraine taken under the Association Agreement between Ukraine and EU. Ukraine has also ratified the Convention 108 of the Council of Europe for Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data, and is consequently expected to ratify the Amending Protocol modernizing the Convention. Therefore, the advice and recommendations of the Council of Europe experts is a valuable and needed support in the process of reforming the data protection regulatory framework in Ukraine.
The two draft laws on personal data protection are currently being developed by the Ukrainian Parliament Committees on human rights and digital transformation and Ombudsperson’s Office separately. During the meetings in Strasbourg both national stakeholders agreed to combine their efforts and benefit both from the extensive expertise and experience of the Ombudsperson’s office in the data protection field and from support and readiness of the Parliament to proceed with adoption of new legislation. The joint working group developing the unified draft law under facilitation of the Council of Europe will be meeting in February in Kyiv to proceed with agreeing of the key aspects of the future law.
As the reform of data protection legislation in Ukraine in line with the European standards includes establishment of the independent supervisory authority, specific attention during the meeting was paid to possible modalities of creation of the Information Commission/Commissioner. Experience of other European countries was presented and the advantages and downsides of various types of data protection authorities were discussed with the leading Council of Europe experts.
Meetings were organised in the framework of the Joint European Union and Council of Europe Project “EU and Council of Europe working together to strengthen the Ombudsperson’s capacity to protect human rights”. The Project will continue providing support to the Ukrainian partners in elaboration of the new legislation on personal data protection in order to ensure compliance with the European regulations and human rights standards.
