The President has no constitutional authority to appoint an Ombudsman for the Protection of Military Personnel. Moreover, such an institution will not be truly independent of the government and will not be able to truly protect the rights of military personnel. This was stated by Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, a member of parliament from the European Solidarity faction and the head of the Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the European Union, at a parliamentary session.
“We are all well aware of the need to provide our defenders with increasingly stronger protection, given the many problematic issues that arise during martial law. European Solidarity shares the need to create a special institution that would provide such protection to our representatives of the Defense Forces. At the same time, the draft law we are currently considering directly violates our international legal obligations,” the committee chair noted.
We propose to create an ombudsman institution that will be independent and will have nothing to do with the Commissioner for Protection. This ombudsman will be appointed, contrary to the constitutional powers provided by the Constitution, directly by the President of Ukraine. And will be dismissed directly by the President of Ukraine, contrary to the fact that European practice provides for the creation of independent institutions for the protection of human rights only through parliamentary instruments of appointment and dismissal, which will truly guarantee the independence of such an institution,” she also emphasized.
We proposed various options in our amendments to prevent violations of the Constitution and create an institution that will become independent and capable of protecting our servicemen. Unfortunately, our colleagues did not listen to our proposals. Unfortunately, these proposals were not considered,” said the “EU” deputy.
“We can also talk about the method of appointment, we can also talk about limiting the action of this institution only for the duration of the legal regime of martial law, to oblige the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine to review this appointment mechanism after the end of martial law. Or provide that the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine should amend the Constitution regarding the president’s powers and, for example, the VRU. Unfortunately, colleagues did not listen to any of these proposals,” she stated.
“By adopting this draft law with this method of appointment, we will, in fact, make it impossible to truly protect our servicemen. A person or institution that is supposed to protect servicemen will not be able to do so when pressure on these servicemen is exerted through the presidential vertical. And such things, unfortunately, can happen,” the deputy warned.
“Therefore, I am very sorry that there is actually no willingness to take into account the position of our faction, which was constructively determined to find a way out so as not to violate the Constitution, not to violate our international legal obligations, and to create a truly real tool to protect our military,” said Klympush-Tsintsadze.