You're reading: Parliament passes law on toughening punishment for corruption

At the second attempt the Ukrainian parliament has adopted at first reading a draft law toughening the punishment of individuals and companies for corruption.

A total of 228 lawmakers supported the draft law on amendments to some Ukrainian laws in the area of the state anticorruption policy on April 15.

According to the explanatory note, the law was passed as a part of the implementation of an action plan on the liberalization of the visa regime with the European Union. The law aims at fulfilling the recommendations of experts of the European Commission on the improvement of anticorruption laws presented during negotiations on the liberalization of the EU visa regime for Ukraine. The experts recommend toughening sanctions for criminal corruption actions.

The draft also proposes amending the law on the principles of preventing corruption. It will allow central executive power agencies that are implementing tax policy to have powers to check the authenticity of information presented in declarations. In particular, the right of the said agencies to receive information on information presented in declarations is foreseen in the law on banks and bank operation.

The document proposes introducing administrative and disciplinary responsibility for untrue information in the property, income and expense declaration.

The draft also proposes amending the law on the principles of preventing corruption, allowing citizens to report cases of corruption anonymously.