On October 17, Law of Ukraine #187-IX “On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts regarding Improvement of Certain Provisions of Code of Criminal Procedure of Ukraine” (former Draft Law #1009) entered into force. The Law envisages certain changes to criminal procedure, in particular regarding conducting covert investigative actions, expertise in criminal investigations, timeframes for pre-trial investigations and possibility to appeal on notification of suspect.
In the very first version of the Draft Law, there were a number of provisions that were changed during consideration in the Parliament in line with Chamber position:
- Provisions, supported by the Chamber, regarding possibility to conduct expertise not only in state expert centers, were kept in final version
- Provisions regarding cancellation of limit timeframes for pre-trial investigations, as well as possibility to challenge notification of suspect, were removed from the final text of the Draft Law, as was requested by the Chamber
In such version amendments to the Code of Criminal Procedure are improved in terms of access to the expertise, at the same time providing more safeguards in case of unreasonably long proceedings in many cases used for creating unlawful pressure as well as possibility to challenge notification of suspect.
The Chamber will continue its work on the implementation of the “Single Window” principle regarding the withdrawal of information from transport telecommunications networks by law enforcement bodies.
