{"id":289301,"date":"2025-07-25T01:04:19","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T01:04:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/289301\/"},"modified":"2025-07-25T01:04:19","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T01:04:19","slug":"ukraines-zelenskyy-introduces-bill-after-anticorruption-protests-politics-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/289301\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine\u2019s Zelenskyy introduces bill after anticorruption protests | Politics News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ukrainian leader came under domestic and international pressure after signing law critics say curbs the powers of the country\u2019s anitcorruption agencies.<\/p>\n

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has submitted a new draft bill<\/a> to the country\u2019s legislature, in an effort to calm outrage over a previously passed law that critics say paves the way for corruption.<\/p>\n

The country\u2019s anticorruption agencies quickly hailed the bill\u2019s introduction on Thursday, saying it would restore their \u201cprocedural powers and guarantees of independence\u201d.<\/p>\n

The Ukrainian leader has contended with protests and condemnation from both within Ukraine and from its closest European allies after a separate controversial law was passed on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

That law placed the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) and the Specialised Anti-Corruption Prosecutor\u2019s Office (SAPO) under the direct authority of the country\u2019s prosecutor general \u2013 a position appointed by the president.<\/p>\n

Zelenskyy initially maintained that the law was needed to respond to suspected \u201cRussian influence\u201d within the agencies amid Russia\u2019s ongoing invasion of Ukraine<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Critics, however, said the law would strip the bodies of their independence and could allow political interference, while failing to address any potential Kremlin-linked operatives.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, thousands of Ukrainians defied martial law<\/a> \u2013 which has been in place since the beginning of Russia\u2019s war \u2013 to take to the streets of Kyiv and other major cities to protest against the law.<\/p>\n

European officials also questioned the law, noting that addressing corruption remains a core requirement both for Ukraine\u2019s future European Union membership and in assuring aid flows to combat Russia.<\/p>\n

Amid the pressure, Zelenskyy backed away from the new law, promising to submit new legislation that would assure \u201call the norms for the independence of anti-corruption institutions will be in place\u201d and that there would be no Russian \u201cinfluence or interference\u201d.<\/p>\n

Opposition lawmakers have also separately prepared their own legislation to revoke the law passed on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey heroically solved the problems that they created just as heroically. Grand imitators,\u201d Yaroslav Zhelezniak, from the opposition Holos party, said on Telegram, criticising Zelenskyy and his allies about-turn.<\/p>\n

Before the new draft bill\u2019s introduction, Zelenskyy spoke with the leaders of Germany and the United Kingdom on Thursday.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Zelenskyy\u2019s office said British Prime Minister Keir Starmer had \u201coffered to involve experts who could contribute to long-term cooperation\u201d on the issue.<\/p>\n

In a post on X, Zelenskyy said he invited Friedrich Merz to \u201cjoin the expert review of the bill\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cFriedrich assured me of readiness to assist,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

It was not immediately clear when Ukraine\u2019s legislature, the Verkhovna Rada, would vote on the new bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ukrainian leader came under domestic and international pressure after signing law critics say curbs the powers of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":289302,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7654],"tags":[2000,299,1824,12,285,332,7661,657,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-289301","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ukraine","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-germany","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-politics","13":"tag-russia","14":"tag-russia-ukraine-war","15":"tag-ukraine","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114911187029292345","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289301","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=289301"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289301\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/289302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}