The bill No. 7163 “On the peculiarities of state policy on ensuring Ukraine’s state sovereignty over the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions”, proposed by the authorities, introduces legislative differences between the occupied territories of Donbas and the Crimea, and hence between the interests of the Ukrainian citizens who have been forcedly displaced to the uncontrolled areas. The head of Kyiv city organization of UKROP, the chairman of the board of “Maidan of Foreign Affairs” Fund Bohdan Yaremenko has written about it on his Facebook page.
“The interests of the Ukrainian citizens, who because of the war happened to be in occupation and were forced to leave the occupied territory, are the same. Their rights are the same. This is defined by the Constitution of Ukraine, the rights and freedoms of the Ukrainian citizens are not differentiated depending on their place of residence! This is an axiom!” stressed Bohdan Yaremenko.
According to him, the document introduces a norm according to which the state, whose armed forces have occupied certain regions of Donbas, is the Russian Federation.
However, neither the current legislation nor the bill on de-occupation gives an answer to the question about who has occupied the Crimea. In addition, the proposed document defines different rights and the mechanism for their implementation for the Ukrainian citizens in ORDLO and in the Crimea. This contradicts the Constitution of Ukraine, said the UKROP member.
“By introducing similar norms, the current authorities continue the practice of constitutional discrimination of the Ukrainian citizens on a territorial basis,” said Bohdan Yaremenko.
In his opinion, the draft law obliges to guarantee national security on the territory of ORDLO. At the same time, judging by the document and the current legislation, the authorities do not see the need to provide national security in the occupied territory of the Crimea. Moreover, the norms of the document lay the groundwork for the decision on renunciation of the territory of the Crimea in the future.
“We consider that formation of such double standards for different regions of the sovereign territory of Ukraine in the legislation is unacceptable!” added the representative of UKROP.
