The draft law No.3711-d got the votes of 305 Ukrainian MPs who supported amendments from Ukraine’s president.
Volodymyr Zelensky pushed for its update to bring it in line with the earlier commitments of Ukrainian government.
Key amendments proposed by Volodymyr Zelensky:
- High Qualification Commission of Judges (HACJ) is set to be fully operational once it has 11 elected judges. The commission will consist of active and retired judges (six of each).
- Zelensky intervention dropped the earlier proposed norm allowing Selection Board and its members recruit international experts for additional selective competition expertise – not they are authorized to hire assistants and translators only
- Authority over procedures of Selection Board establishment is now also granted to acting head of Higher Council of Justice
- The approved law upheld the norm that grants a deciding vote to international experts in selection procedure – in case of a split vote, the decision favors vote of the group that has 2 international experts out of 3 Selection Board members.
The newly adopted law No.3711-d is set to renew work of High Qualification Commission of Judges.
According to the updated policy, HQCJ is (a) a is a public collegial body of judicial governance that operates on a permanent basis in the justice system of Ukraine that (b) consists of 16 members selected out of active or retired Ukrainian judges each of whom (c) is fluent in the official language, has completed higher legal education and has at least 15 years of professional legal experience, belongs to the legal profession and meets the criterion of political neutrality; HQCJ members (d) are appointed through selective competition by Selection Board that consists of 6 members with three of those appointed by High Council of Justice and three others proposed by international organizations cooperating with Ukraine in anti-corruption reform.
Following the selective competition, the Higher Council of Justice will hold interviews with short-listed candidates to choose and appoint new HQCJ members.
The work of High Qualification Commission of Judges stalled in 2019 after failing attempts to select its new members, which disrupted selection and recertification of judges in Ukraine.