Ukraine abolishes parliamentary immunity
Today, September 3, the Ukrainian Parliament approved the removal of parliamentary immunity provision from the Ukrainian Constitution.
373 Ukrainian MPs voted in favor of the bill. The bill comes into force on January 1, 2020.
The entire faction “Opposition Platform — For Life” refused to vote for the bill.
Before the vote, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky spoke from the podium and called on the parliamentarians to complete the process of abolishing the parliamentary immunity. He reminded that it only concerns the immunity from the criminal offenses.
On the evening of August 30, at the plenary session of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, the MPs approved in the first reading the draft law on amending Article 80 of the Ukrainian Constitution which proposes to cancel the Parliamentary immunity.
Bill 7203 was initially submitted to the Ukrainian Parliament by the fifth President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko. The bill proposes to exclude from Article 80 of the Constitution the provision that MPs cannot be prosecuted, detained or arrested without the consent of the Parliament, and that they are guaranteed a parliamentary Immunity.