Ukraine’s Defense Ministry opposes toughening punishments for military
7 September 11:17
Following public protests, the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine supported the exclusion of the provision on toughening punishments for military personnel for insubordination from draft law 13452. On the evening of Saturday, September 6, the ministry said that it had held consultations with the leadership of the relevant committees of the Verkhovna Rada on high-profile bills concerning the rights of the military and the toughening of their punishments.
This was reported by "Komersant Ukrainian".
“The Ministry of Defense of Ukraine supports the position of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Law Enforcement and the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defense and Intelligence on the need to exclude from Bill No. 13452 provisions on increasing the responsibility of the military for disobedience,” the ministry said. They added that the document needs to be finalized in cooperation with the relevant parliamentary committees.
The Ministry of Defense is in favor of establishing a military ombudsman institution
“Discipline in the army should not be based on punishment, but on justice,” the Defense Ministry said. In addition, the ministry assured that it had reached an agreement with MPs “on full support for the draft law ‘On the Military Ombudsman’ submitted to the parliament by the President of Ukraine.”
Protests for justice for the military
On the evening of September 5, mass protests were held in Kyiv, Dnipro, and Lviv in support of the adoption of the law on the military ombudsman and against the toughening of punishments for the military. In the capital of Ukraine, the rally, according to the organizers, gathered about a thousand participants. They also opposed Bill 13260, which was adopted in the first reading, which excludes the possibility for courts to apply mitigating norms to the military after the first AWOL or desertion. The protesters also demanded that the provisions of Bill 8271, adopted in 2022, on the punishment of the military, be repealed.
