18:25 16.07.2024

There should be no formal approach to leaving unit by military – Supreme Court's president

3 min read
There should be no formal approach to leaving unit by military – Supreme Court's president

There should be no formal approach to crimes related to the voluntarily leaving the military unit, I hope the prosecutor's office will support this position in practice, President of the Supreme Court of Ukraine Stanislav Kravchenko said.

Expressing in an exclusive interview with Interfax-Ukraine his opinion regarding the position of the director of the State Bureau of Investigations (SBI) that law enforcement officers do not make statistics on voluntarily leaving the military unit, but, on the contrary, strive for the return of military personnel to their units, Kravchenko said: "The director says very correctly SBI, 'there should not be an exclusively formal approach to such things. I hope that prosecutors, as procedural leaders, support this position, and it will work in a practical way."

"Honestly: I was very afraid that an exclusively formal approach would lead to formal accusations. Even at the beginning of the war, the head of the Military Law Enforcement Service at that time, General Hutsol, drew attention to the fact that out of four people who refuse to carry out an order or leave combat positions, literally immediately three are ready to return to duty," the head of the court said.

He drew attention to the fact that we are talking about the human factor: "the feeling of fear is natural, so this must be taken into account."

"Another matter is how we will use this in practice. Both law enforcement agencies and the courts. You raised the important issue of the discretion of prosecutors on behalf of the state when forming a public charge: in which cases to form this charge and in which not," Kravchenko said.

The president of the Supreme Court said: "Here we are talking about determining the border: will there be more benefit from the fact that we formally treat the person and the court sentences the person, or can this person benefit the state in freedom? The prosecutor has the right to make a deal, in in particular, and the right to withdraw charges in certain cases."

Earlier, in a comment to Interfax-Ukraine, the SBI director said the bureau is focused on returning fighters who left their place of service to their positions, and not on increasing the number of criminal cases against them. "Our task is to facilitate the return of fighters to combat positions, and not to improve the statistics of open criminal proceedings for evasion of service," he said.

According to Sukhachev, preventive measures and explanatory work are priorities in this matter.

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