To critics of the legislation, this is at odds with more than a decade of pro-democracy and anti-corruption efforts.<\/p>\n
It is such aspirations that led to the Euromaidan uprising and the downfall of pro-Russian president Viktor Yanukovych in 2014, followed by Russia’s invasion and the deaths of hundreds of thousands people.<\/p>\n
The Ukrainian government has cited Russian influence for curtailing Nabu’s powers.<\/p>\n
The day before the controversial law was passed, Ukraine’s Security Service and the prosecutor general’s office carried out searches and arrests targeting alleged Russian spies at Nabu.<\/p>\n
The move has sparked concern among Ukraine’s Western allies.<\/p>\n
The Ukrainian independent anti-corruption system was set up at their insistence and under their supervision 10 years ago.<\/p>\n
It was a key precondition for their aid and stronger ties as Ukraine declared a pro-democracy course amid Russia’s initial invasion of 2014.<\/p>\n
“The European Union is concerned about Ukraine’s recent actions with regard to its anti-corruption institutions,” says European Commission spokesperson Guillaume Mercier.<\/p>\n
“The EU provides significant financial assistance to Ukraine, conditional on progress in transparency, judicial reform, and democratic governance.”<\/p>\n
Stamping out corruption is also a key requirement for Ukraine’s application to join the EU.<\/p>\n
The European commissioner for enlargement, Marta Kos, criticised the bill’s adoption.<\/p>\n
“The dismantling of key safeguards protecting Nabu’s independence is a serious step back,” Kos wrote on social media, saying the two bodies were “essential” for Ukraine’s EU path.<\/p>\n
Ukraine’s deputy prime minister for European and Euro-Atlantic integration, Taras Kachka, said he had assured Marta Kos there would be no compromise on anti-corruption, and that “all core functions remain intact”.<\/p>\n
Dmytro Kuleba, who stood down as foreign minister last year, said it was a “bad day for Ukraine” and that the president had a choice – either to stand on the side of the people or not.<\/p>\n
Ambassadors from the G7 group of nations have said they would like to discuss the pressure on Nabu and Sap with the Ukrainian leadership.<\/p>\n
However, Ukraine’s allies would be extremely reluctant to roll back the aid and co-operation at a time when its troops are struggling on the frontline.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"To critics of the legislation, this is at odds with more than a decade of pro-democracy and anti-corruption…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":284815,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[12,26],"class_list":{"0":"post-284814","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114901769596201167","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=284814"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284814\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/284815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=284814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=284814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=284814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}