The case against Georgiy Logvynskyi must be closed. An open statement

This happens during the Russian Federation’s armed aggression against Ukraine, when our state, together with civil society, is making significant efforts to affirm Ukraine’s European choice, obtain international assistance and bring to justice the Russian citizens who committed war crimes.

On July 10, the NABU website published news about a serving of suspicion in absentia to Georgiy Logvynskyi, a lawyer, Member of the Ukrainian Parliament of the 8th convocation, and an honorary member of the PACE. This suspicion was served within the framework of criminal proceedings No. 52017000000000361 of June 1, 2017, which NABU is investigating on suspicion of Bernatska N.I, the former Deputy Minister of Justice, Babin D.V., the former Government Commissioner for ECtHR, and other persons in the misappropriation of UAH 54 million of state budget funds by executing the ECtHR judgment in the case of Zolotoy Mandarin Oil v. Ukraine.

The Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group (KHPG), which specializes in interaction with the ECtHR (more than 70% of successful cases against Ukraine in ECtHR under Art. 2, 3, 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights were represented by the KHPG lawyers), acting as an amicus curiae together with other, including international, experts in the field of application of the Convention and ad-hoc judges of the ECtHR conducted a thorough legal analysis of the criminal proceedings and publicly available materials. Through this analysis, we identified blatant human rights violations, which, in our opinion, indicate that this investigation serves a different purpose than the administration of justice.

We have already stated the political motives of the prosecution in this case back in 2018.

Our conclusions were fully confirmed by the decision of the ECtHR Plenary of 06.07.2020 when the entire composition of the European Court found that Ukraine reneged on its international obligations as a result of unprofessional actions of certain NABU officials who conducted secret surveillance and evidence collection in violation of national and international law, exerted pressure on the participants in the process and committed other violations. The court, which “not only has the right but also the obligation to revoke the immunity of a person in any case where immunity would impede the administration of justice,” for the first time in history, refused to lift diplomatic immunity from Georgii Logvynskyi, the husband of ECtHR judge from Ukraine Anna Yudkivska.

After such a resolute decision of the European Court, the bias of some representatives of the Ukrainian anti-corruption bodies involved in the investigation is beyond doubt. Especially given that no steps have been taken to correct the violations identified by the European Court and bring the perpetrators to justice, which would be natural in any democratic state.

Currently, the European Court of Human Rights is in the final stage of considering applications of Georgii Logvynskyi and applications of the suspects in the said criminal case against Ukraine in connection with violations of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, in particular, Article 6 (right to a fair trial), Article 8 (right to respect for private life) and Article 18 (Limitation of restriction on rights) (applications No. 32671/20, No. 25382/20, No. 41027/20). They passed the communication stage in 2021 and are awaiting consideration on the merits.

This case has already had negative consequences for Ukraine. The investigation directly interferes with the activities of the ECtHR, which is in the final stages of considering the interstate case Ukraine v. Russia, as well as several thousand individual complaints of Ukrainian citizens joined to it, which are of strategic importance for further recovery of damages from Russia in favor of Ukraine (in the sum of hundreds of billions of euros). The criminal proceedings in question have already slowed down the consideration of these cases by the ECtHR and damaged Ukraine’s position.

Ukraine’s budget has already suffered significant damage because due to this criminal proceeding the Ministry of Justice officially informed the ECtHR that further friendly settlement agreements and unilateral declarations are impossible. This significantly increases budget expenditures on compensation, and over the years, the state budget has lost UAH hundreds of millions!

Since 2018, we have repeatedly appealed to the SAP and the Prosecutor General’s Office, warning of such consequences. Unfortunately, in the best Soviet traditions, our appeals were answered by the SAP prosecutors in charge of the proceedings in question.

Given all the above facts, this case risks becoming the first ECtHR case that may lead to a decision about political persecution in Ukraine after the overthrow of the Yanukovych regime.

We demand that the SAP leadership decide to defend the interests of the state and the rule of law and close this shameful criminal proceeding.

Mustafa Dzhemilev
Member of the Ukrainian Parliament,
Leader of the Crimean Tatar people

Yevgeniy Zakharov,
Director of the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group,
Chairman of the Board of the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union
Co-chairman of the International Association “Memorial"

Joseph Zissels
Executive co-president of the Vaad Ukraine,
Executive Vice President of the Congress of National Communities of Ukraine,
Vice President of the World Jewish Congress

Ihor Kozlovsky,
Scientist, religious scholar, writer,
President of the Center for Religious Studies and International Spiritual Relations