On December 11–12, 2023, the members of the Commission Liudmyla Volkova, Oleh Koliush and Roman Sabodash took part in the National Ukrainian Judicial Forum held in Dnipro. The event, co-organized by the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) in Ukraine and the Association for the Development of Judicial Self-Government of Ukraine, was dedicated to the consideration of cases on the protection of citizens’ rights under martial law in Ukraine.
The main topics of the discussion included the peculiarities of considering cases related to the armed conflict in eastern Ukraine, protection of the rights of persons affected by the armed conflict, as well as the experience of European countries and the practice of the European Court of Human Rights in the context of protecting the fundamental rights of internally displaced persons.
Representatives of the HQCJ provided the Forum with important information for judges of appellate and local courts. Commission member Oleh Koliush, in his report on the evaluation procedure for judges in Donetsk and Luhansk Regions, highlighted the peculiarities of interviews and the need to hold closed sessions in some cases to protect the rights of individuals or partially restrict access to sensitive information. Mr. Koliush, in particular, noted that the public supervises the process of judicial evaluation through the Public Integrity Council. At the same time, the Commission is working on establishing effective communication with civil society. Answering the participants’ questions about the visits of judges to the russian federation and the temporarily occupied territories since 2014, Oleg Koliush informed that such information is assessed in conjunction with other data from the judge’s dossier.
Liudmyla Volkova spoke about the peculiarities of judges’ secondments during martial law. She noted that judges have no right to evade their professional duties. In this regard, the Commission recommended that judges should be sent without their consent to courts where the territorial jurisdiction of cases was determined.
Roman Sabodash, speaking on the issue of submitting a judge’s integrity declaration in the context of today’s challenges, drew attention to the novelties in the declaration and the Commission’s explanations on the procedure for filling it out. Mr. Sabodash also presented the Commission’s electronic service, the Judicial Career Cabinet, which will be used for online submission of documents for participation in the competition for judicial positions in the courts of appeal.
The members of the Commission answered numerous questions from the judicial community.
The Forum was also attended by judges of the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Court of Ukraine, representatives of courts of different instances and regions, member of the Council of Judges of Ukraine Valeriia Chorna, forensic psychologist of the National School of Judges of Ukraine Anastasiia Horetska, members of the Ukrainian Parliament, and representatives of the Yaroslav Mudryi National Law University.
The Norwegian Refugee Council in Ukraine was represented by the Head of the NRC Roberto Vila-Sexto, and the Leading Lawyer of the Information, Counselling and Legal Aid Department Yulia Voronkova.
