Transparency International Ukraine has added its voice to calls of concern over the latest move against the Anti-Corruption Centre [AntAC] which has been the target of a smear campaign over recent months

Two years after a journalist investigation found evidence that certain Kyiv judges had ‘issued court rulings’ from their holiday spots abroad, the alleged probe into the judges’ behaviour has been quietly shelved, unlike the criminal investigation involving the Slidstvo.info journalist, Dmytro Hnap

The article is devoted to the reasons for the inhibition of the police reform and the prospects for its continuation.

A Russian who was forced by the FSB to fight against the Ukrainian Army in Donbas and who surrendered voluntarily to Ukraine is now in danger of being extradited to Russia. The supposed criminal charges against Vladimir Radyuk have almost certainly been concocted to secure the forced return of a person who can provide vital testimony about Russia’s military aggression in eastern Ukraine

Less than two months after a raid by the SBU [Security Service] on Ukraine’s main investment bank aroused huge furor, the SBU has again positioned itself firmly in the firing line. They stand accused of corruption and lying, and have only added to the negative publicity by declaring Mykhailo Yakhymovych, the man who made the allegations, on the wanted list, claiming falsely that he has fled to Russia

If the Security Service’s search of the offices of Yandex Ukraine on May 29 was supposed to convince people that the sanctions imposed upon the company two weeks ago were justified, the aim was not achieved.

A family who recently spoke out publicly about disturbing measures to drive out Romani residents of Kyiv have been set upon by a group of former soldiers whose civic organization was organized under the patronage of an adviser to Ukraine’s Interior Minister

Human rights groups have demanded a proper investigation into the fatal incident on May 16 in the Kharkiv oblast which left one man dead, and four injured. All the victims were Roma residents of Vilshany, in the Derhachi district, and witness accounts suggest that the attack was organized by the local authorities.

A parliamentary bill that could have killed crucial investigative work by Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau has been sent for reworking a day before a scheduled second reading. The danger to Ukraine’s efforts to fight corruption has been deferred, but not eradicated

Two weeks after 4 suspects, one accused of murder, fled to Russia, another person has been released despite objections from the prosecutor. Euromaidan SOS has spoken of a coordinated system for escaping justice and believes that it could not exist without the direct connivance of those in power.

Yury Krysin admits taking part in the fatal attack on journalist Viacheslav Veremiy during Euromaidan and has been convicted of numerous other violent crimes. Yet “Ukrainian judges have only to see him and they’re seized by a burning desire to release him from custody”

A Ukrainian court has ordered the detention, pending extradition, of Shakhban Isakov, an asylum-seeker whom Russia wants to prosecute on the same dubious charges as those Russia has brought against two renowned Crimean Tatar leaders, both Ukrainian MPs

At present the Security Service of Ukraine [SBU] is at the same time a security service and a law enforcement body.  Nowhere in the civilized world do security services carry out law enforcement activities. Their purpose is to gather information within the framework of competence defined by law.

A journalist investigation has highlighted disturbing police and prosecutor links which may explain the baffling downgrading in the charges against Yury Krysin, who took part in the killing of journalist Viacheslav Veremiy during the bloodiest days of Euromaidan in February 2014.

A brief outline of the first stages of the competition

The likely appointment of Dmytro Rudenko to a top post in Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau has appalled many rights activists who remember his active role in the persecution of Vinnytsa human rights activist Dmytro Groysman. It raises questions also as to how he came to be appointed head of the Khmelnytsky National Police back in May 2016.

Three years after the savage dispersal on Nov 30, 2013 of young students on Maidan, none of the Berkut officers directly involved have been convicted, and some are continuing to work in the police. The reason in many cases for the lack of progress lies not in the investigators, but in sabotage by the courts

Ukraine’s Security Service [SBU] appears to be collaborating with its Russian FSB counterpart even where there are strong grounds for believing that FSB interest in Russian citizens living in Ukraine is as politically motivated as its persecution of Ukrainians in occupied Crimea and Russia

Khatia Dekonoidze has resigned as Head of National Police seemingly in frustration at limited scope to carry out real reform and political interference. She also says that Vadim Troyan, now Acting Head, is not politically independent and therefore unsuited to the post. These are not the only concerns about Troyan’s suitability for high police posts.

Ukraine’s recently appointed Prosecutor General Yury Lutsenko looks set to destroy an investigative body which has finally made progress on investigating crimes linked with Euromaidan, and the families of Maidan victims and lawyers representing them are outraged.