In 2015, Ukraine launched an ambitious program to reform its corrupt and deeply distrusted police force.
Five years later, during an online conference held on June 15, most experts agreed that police reform under Interior Minister Arsen Avakov had failed.
The event, called “Zero Corruption Police: Mission (Im)possible?,” was moderated by Kyiv Post chief editor Brian Bonner.
It was part of a series of webinars organized by the Zero Corruption Conference, involving the Anti-Corruption Action Center in Kyiv and its partners. The next in the series will take place on June 23 from 5 p. m. to 7 p. m. Kyiv time. Details can be found at https://www.facebook.com/zerocorruptionconference/
As protests and riots spread across the United States as a result of the murder of George Floyd by a police officer on May 25, the issue of police violence is gaining growing attention worldwide.
In Ukraine, the problem of police brutality and unaccountability is even more prominent than in many developed democracies.
Historically, Ukrainian law enforcement agencies have been used for political repression. Even after the EuroMaidan Revolution that ousted President Viktor Yanukovych in 2014, Avakov, the nation’s top cop since then, has been accused of sabotaging police reform and being entangled in corruption since he took office in 2014. Moreover, he has few accomplishments in solving big crimes.
He has consistently defended his record. Here are excerpts of the two-hour talk, which is available online on the Zero Corruption Conference Facebook page and on its YouTube channel:
Finnish Interior Minister Maria Ohisalo
The conference’s keynote speaker described the situation with the police in her country, which seems to be the opposite of its Ukrainian equivalent in many aspects.
She said over 80 to 90 percent of Finns trusted the police. This contrasts with Ukraine, where 49 percent distrusted the police and 31 percent trusted it, according to a poll published by Rating Group in October.
Ohisalo said, however, that poorer and marginalized groups tend not to trust the police, and trust in her force somewhat fell after a former head of the Helsinki Drug Squad was recently convicted of drug-related offenses.
“We do charge everybody in the same way even if they have high positions,” she said in what also appears to be a stark contrast with impunity in Ukraine. “It shows that in the end the system works.”
Ohisalo also emphasized transparency in the work of the police, saying that her ministry is trying to “be as open as possible” and seeks to “put everything out so that people could have a wide public debate.”
She also warned against excessive police violence – a frequent phenomenon in Ukraine, saying that “every time force is used, it is always the last resort.”
Matilda Bogner, head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine
She cited the example of two police officers arrested in May for torturing and raping a woman at a police station in Kaharlyk, a town located 75 kilometers south of Kyiv.
“(The Kaharlyk case) showed this ongoing structural problem within the police,” she said.
Bogner added that “if you’re a victim of a crime that has been committed by law enforcement officers then you’re not likely to report that to police or others in the law enforcement system.”
Bogner also called for “ending the practice when confession is relied upon as proof” in criminal cases and criticized torture and ill-treatment by the police.
She said that the U.N. had monitored many cases where there is sufficient evidence but they are nonetheless closed, then re-opened again and then closed again.
Tetiana Pechonchyk, head of human rights group ZMINA
She said that her organization had documented about 400 incidents involving activists since the EuroMaidan Revolution, including threats, physical assaults, fabricated criminal cases, defamation and smear campaigns. Of these, there were about 200 physical assaults and eight murders.
Many of the attacks targeted anti-corruption, environmental and human rights activists, Pechonchyk added.
“Why are all these attacks happening?” she said. “The main reason is impunity.(The police and other law enforcers) must take all possible steps to investigate these attacks. But they are not taking even the minimum necessary steps.”
The police classify crimes against activists in a wrong way – for example, by treating them as “hooliganism”- and fail to identify organizers, Pechonchyk added.
“The problem is that we don’t have efficient reform of police,” she said. “There is no political will to continue reform of the police, the problem is with Mr. Avakov who is enjoying his seventh year as interior minister with no responsibility for what is happening with those attacks.”
Khatia Dekanoidze, ex-head of the Ukrainian police
She was the head of Georgia’s police academy and education minister under ex-President Mikheil Saakashvili in 2007 to 2012. Later she was the head of Ukraine’s National Police in 2015 to 2016 and was in charge of police reform.
However, now she is critical of the reform efforts, arguing that they were blocked and sabotaged.
Only 5,656 police officers, or about 6 percent of the police force, were eventually fired as a result of the vetting procedure. Many have been reinstated by the courts.
“After a year nothing changed at all,” Dekanoidze said. “There is a lack of political will (to reform the police).”
She also argued that reforming the police without revamping other law enforcement agencies does not make sense.
“It’s about reforming the whole criminal justice system,” Dekanoidze added. “The core is the judiciary system”
Although the corrupt Soviet-style traffic police was transformed into a Western-style police force, the rest of the police remains the same.
“We tried to touch criminal police and to shake it but unfortunately what we see right now is still the same,” she said. “Whose responsibility is this is that there is no finished police reform? The whole political establishment starting from the president, ministers and parliament.”
Another major problem is political interference with the police.
“Nobody from the political side should interfere with investigations and operational activities,” Dekanoidze argued.
She said she did not even have the right to fire or appoint top ministry officials without Avakov’s approval.
“(In this situation) it doesn’t make sense to be the chief of the national police at all,” she added.
Mathew Schaaf, head of Freedom House’s branch in Ukraine
He said one of the major issues was the “politicization” of the Interior Ministry. He also criticized the police’s lack of accountability and impunity.
Moreover, ethnic minorities do not receive sufficient protection from the Ukrainian police, he added.
“The Roma community needs the help and support of the police but rarely gets them,” adding that the police are instead often accused of being behind attacks on the Roma people.
Although “there has been an improvement in the police capacity to provide for security and safety of (LGBT) events in big cities,” there is still little trust for the police in the LGBT community, Schaaf continued.
“The police are not seen as credible allies for these communities,” he said.
Another problem is that the police often fail to register complaints within 24 hours, as required by the law, and often violate the “freedom of expression and freedom of assembly.”
As an example, he cited the case when the police arrested two peaceful protesters in Rivne in May 2019 for one-person pickets against Zelenskiy, accusing them of violating public assembly rules.
Oleksandra Ustinova, a lawmaker from the Holos faction
She said that many of the police officers who are now supposed to maintain public order were the same ones who committed crimes against protesters during the 2013-2014 EuroMaidan Revolution, which ousted ex-President Viktor Yanukovych.
On June 15, the police were accused of beating Holos lawmaker Roman Lozynsky and a protester at a rally against house arrest imposed on activist Serhiy Sternenko, who has been charged with murder for killing a person who attacked him. Kyiv Police Chief Andriy Kryshchenko told the Ukrainska Pravda news website that the police officers who beat the activist had been suspended.
“I had kind of a flashback to 2013 when we were standing on Maidan,” Ustinova said.
She said that “police reform touched only the patrol police, and criminal police has never been reformed.”
Ustinova also said that the State Investigation Bureau is investigating more than 5,000 violations by police officers, including torture and beatings.
“Avakov is the only person who should be responsible for the failure of police reform,” she said. “He has been in power for six years. Avakov should take responsibility for it because he was first leading it and then did everything possible for this police reform to fail.”
She argued that all presidents “want to control law enforcement” and are opposed to independent law enforcement agencies.
“We can see the same problem with Zelensky and his team,” Ustinova added.
Anastasia Radina, head of parliament’s anti-corruption committee
She was criticized along with other lawmakers for voting for Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk’s Cabinet, which included Avakov, in August. However, she voted against re-appointing Avakov to the next Cabinet headed by Denys Smhygal in March.
Radina said she had changed her opinion.
“It is true that I was one of those who voted in September for the Cabinet of Ministers, which included Interior Minister (Avakov),” she said. “I did not support (Avakov) the second time.”
She also said that she had signed a draft motion in the Rada to dismiss Avakov.
“After the brutal rape that happened in Kaharlyk the issue of police reform is just past the line beyond which political claims can be made that police reform has anything to do with success,” Radina argued.
She also said that police officers are often dismissed for violations and then re-appear in different police units. Moreover, 39 percent of victims refuse to report crimes to the police, Radina added.
“This is the most valid and most accurate symptom of how police reform is doing,” she said. “Such a situation cannot be called police reform.”
Antti Juhani Hartikainen, head of the European Union’s advisory mission in Ukraine
He was more upbeat on the Ukrainian police.
He praised what he saw as the police’s neutrality during last year’s presidential and parliamentary elections.
“During the previous elections the police communicated more effectively,” Hartikainen added.
No large-scale vote rigging was reported nationwide in the April 21, 2019 presidential election. However, the police investigated alleged voting fraud and vote buying in favor of then President Petro Poroshenko, and evidence of voting fraud emerged in the Donbas and some other regions.
He said the police had started performing better at mass events and protests
Although the police’s better protection of LGBT rallies has been praised, civic activists have criticized the police for violent crackdowns on protesters in Dnipro in 2017 and in Kyiv in 2018, as well as at other rallies.
Hartikainen went on to say that the advisory mission is “happy that the police have plans to develop anti-corruption units, and this is excellent.”
Meanwhile, Avakov’s record on corruption has been criticized since in 2017 his son Oleksandr and the minister’s ex-deputy, Serhiy Chebotar, were charged by the National Anti-Corruption Bureau with embezzling Hr 14 million ($550,000) by supplying overpriced backpacks to the Interior Ministry. They deny the accusations of wrongdoing.
Hartikainen said, however, that he was disappointed that the Interior Ministry had so far failed to approve a strategy to comply with European best practices that the EU supports.
