On Monday, June 3, President Volodymyr Zelensky proposed a bill on confiscation of illegal assets and penalties for their acquisition. The text of the bill was published on the Verkhovna Rada’s website.
The official name of the bill is "On amending some legislative acts of Ukraine on the confiscation of illegal assets of individuals authorized to perform the functions of state or local governments, and introducing penalties for the acquisition of such assets."
The draft law provides for the additional Article 368-5 of the Criminal Code, according to which unlawful enrichment is punished by “imprisonment for a term from five to ten years with the deprivation of rights to hold certain positions or engage in certain activities for up to three years”.
Zelensky proposes to punish government workers for assets with a value higher than the individual’s income by 12 thousand non-taxable minimum incomes of citizens (currently 204 thousand UAH).
The previous article, abolished by the Constitutional Court, provided for punishment for those who had a difference between income and assets in the amount of one thousand incomes (17 thousand UAH).
Additionally, in the abolished version the assets were considered illegal if "the legality of their acquisition was not supported by evidence." According to the Constitutional Court of Ukraine, it contradicted the presumption of innocence. In Zelensky’s bill, there is no such phrasing.
Furthermore, the president’s bill provides for one single degree of gravity of this crime. In the earlier version, the punishment was different: up to two years for regular employees, from two to five year for those holding responsible positions, and from five to ten years for those holding particularly responsible positions. In all cases, the property was confiscated.