According to the draft Opinion of the Venice Commission, imprisonment for lying in the declaration must be maintained – NACP

The Venice Commission of the Council of Europe published a draft opinion on the situation in Ukraine, which has developed in connection with the Decision of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine (CCU) on the e-declaration system. The draft Opinion states, inter alia, that the punishment in the form of imprisonment for intentional failure to submit a declaration and intentionally providing inaccurate information to a certain extent must be maintained. This limit in all registered draft laws to implement the CCU’s Decision has been doubled – from 250 to 500 amounts of minimum subsistence level (from ~ UAH 500 thousand to ~ UAH 1 million). “The sanction in the form of imprisonment should be preserved for punishment for the most significant violations,” – the Venice Commission Opinion reads. The Venice Commission also determined that “The Decision of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine No. 13-r/2020 has no clear reasoning, is not based on international law and was allegedly adopted with procedural violations – an unaddressed issue of the conflict of interest of certain judges.” The National Agency on Corruption Prevention (NACP) emphasizes that some media disseminated incorrect information: that the Commission allegedly considers the verification of judges’ declarations by the High Qualification Commission of Judges (HQCJ) as one of the possible solutions. Instead, the Opinion clearly states that the NACP should remain the sole agency for verifying declarations, submitting to the HQCJ regular summary reports on the results of full verification of judges’ declarations. “As the Ukrainian legislator plans to oblige the NACP to periodically report on its activities regarding the judges, the High Qualification Commission of Judges (HQCJ) seems to be the most appropriate body to play this role in the context of Ukraine, through its authority to verify the declarations of judges’ integrity,” the Venice Commission stated. The full English text of the Venice Commission Opinion is available here.