Parliament on Nov. 10 passed a number of laws to meet the European Union’s requirements for easing travel to the 28-nation bloc, prompting smiles from President Petro Poroshenko as he praised the “absolute consistency” of the country’s adaptation to Western norms.
Others weren’t so optimistic. Heated debate and prolonged voting dragged
on past a key deadline – Nov. 9. That was the initial deadline set by the EU
for it to consider removing visa requirements by January 2016.
Moreover, measures for the arrest and confiscation of proceeds from
graft were watered down by lawmakers. They were softened to the extent that a
new Asset Recovery Office, also an EU-requirement, might end up sitting idle
with nothing seized, critics said.
Referring to the softened legislation, the executive director of the
Anti-Corruption Action Center, Daria Kaleniuk, an expert in stolen asset
recovery, said, “they killed arrest.”
Echoing her words were Deputy Prosecutor General Vitaliy Kasko and
Justice Minister Pavlo Petrenko, who joined a session in the rule-of-law
parliamentary committee to argue for tougher measures. The head of the newly
formed Anti-Corruption Bureau, Artem Sytnik, had also voiced concerns.
“These norms will interfere both in the
prosecutor’s work and in the efforts of the Anti-Corruption Bureau,” Kasko told
the Kyiv Post, adding that parliament had nullified and impaired existing norms
for freezing the property of suspects.
“In the future, we will have to prove that
every single piece of property is obtained by criminal means (to seize it) – we
don’t have to do that now, so that is clearly worse,” he said.
Batkivshchyna Party lawmaker Serhiy Vlasenko, who authored some of the
amendments that softened the asset-seizure bill, told the Kyiv Post it was only
natural that investigators and prosecutors had to substantiate every act of
property arrest.
“They wanted to (be able to) take anything
from anybody,” he said, arguing that it would be far too dangerous to give
corrupt and power-abusing authorities the even wider powers to seize private
property that had been proposed in the government’s draft.
In turn, Kasko argued that many EU countries had even harsher asset
arrest rules than those proposed by the government.
Anti-corruption activists like Vitaliy Shabunin, who heads
Anti-Corruption Action Center, said that the lawmakers were trying to defend
their fraudulently obtained wealth, as harsh asset arrest rules were likely to
hurt a number of lawmakers. That was why the “confiscation (of criminal assets)
is now in a coma.”
Kasko said the confiscation of property now could no longer be used as a
default punishment in cases against corrupt officials due to the burden of
proof for every piece of property.
Vlasenko countered that his measures were intended to ensure fair
trials. “Investigators and prosecutors need to do the old fashion investigative
work of collecting evidence,” he said.
Outside parliament, Vlasenko’s position was backed by seasoned lawyer
Igor Fomin, who had defended former Interior Minister Yuriy Lutsenko in
2010-2012.
“The proposed broad powers to seize
property would violate basic rights,” Fomin told the Kyiv Post.
Backing Vlasenko’s amendments at the parliamentary tribune, lawmaker
Yuriy Lutsenko said that if a corrupt official had given his driver a Mercedes
Benz purchased with dirty money, the investigator should have every right to
seize the vehicle, but not by default to seize other cars or real estate owned
by the official or his driver.
Another parliament heavyweight backing Vlasenko was Viktor Pynzenyk, a Petro Poroshenko Bloc lawmaker and
former minister of finance. He said that the government draft would have
empowered the Asset Recovery Office to sell off arrested property – prior to
final court decisions on confiscation. “We can’t allow (that kind of) legalized
hostile takeovers,” he told the Kyiv Post in an interview. He was also against
the transfer of seized funds from bank accounts of the owner to the accounts of
the Asset Recovery Office.
Vlasenko, dismissing criticisms of his amendments, said his versions of
the bills were in line with the minimal requirement in the underlying EU
directive. In the end, the lawmakers passed his versions of the laws.
The legislation allows the owner of a seized asset to “manage” it under
seizure. Vlasenko explained that an owner could continue to occupy seized real
estate, but that the new Asset Recovery Office would prevent asset stripping of
seized assets.
Both sides in the lawmaking dispute cited EU norms and documents. But all were happy that control of arrested assets had
been transferred from investigators to a centralized and transparent office –
investigators had been known to sell off seized property and pocket the
proceeds, or return it to the owner for a bribe.
Brussels too seemed happy with the passing of the
anti-corruption laws. Welcoming the new legislation, EU Ambassador to Ukraine
Jan Tombinski said in a Nov. 10 comment that “asset recovery is a key
component of the fight against corruption and other financial and economic
crimes and organized crime. It can contribute in an important way to the
overall reform process and economic recovery of the country, in addition to
providing a greater sense of justice.”
He did add though that “The latest amendments
discussed in the Ukrainian parliament appear to raise a number of concerns as
to their compliance with desired EU standards.”
Kyiv Post staff writer
Johannes Wamberg Andersen can be reached at [email protected]
