OREANDA-NEWS. March 20, 2013. Ukraine will represent the Third additional report concerning recommendations of anti-corruption GRECO recommendations on the outcomes of joint first and second evaluation rounds for our country.  Presentation will be held during the 59-th plenary sitting of Group of states of the Council of Europe against Corruption (GRECO) slated for March 18-22, 2013 in Strasbourg (France). This was informed by Justice Minister Olexandr Lavrynovych. 

According to the Justice Minister, Ukraine plans to inform GRECO about the changes included to the Ordinance about the National anticorruption committee pursuant to which a role of society in the activity of the mentioned body was significantly raised and order of forming of its composition improved.

Besides, the Ukrainian delegation will inform GRECO about submitting by the Government for consideration by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine draft laws of Ukraine “On making changes to the Criminal and Criminal Procedural Code of Ukraine with regards to improvement of the confiscation procedure”, “On making amendments to certain legislative acts of Ukraine concerning introducing measures of criminal legal character regarding juridical persons” and “On making changes to certain legislative acts of Ukraine concerning improvement of legislation in prevention and counteraction to corruption” and about other changes in legislation joined with implementation of the mentioned recommendations.

The Minister reminded that the mentioned bills had been elaborated by the Justice Ministry on implementation of a series of GRECO recommendations.

On the outcomes, during a plenary GRECO sitting, it is planned to consider and approve the Third additional report about the state of implementation by Ukraine of recommendations of the mentioned organization given on the outcomes of joint first and second rounds of evaluation.

It is known that the Group of States Against Corruption was created by the Council of Europe in 1999 to hold monitoring of keeping anti-corruption standards of the organization. Now the GRECO includes 49 member-states (48 European countries and the United States of America).

GRECO’s objective is to improve the capacity of its members to fight corruption by monitoring their compliance with Council of Europe anti-corruption standards through a dynamic process of mutual evaluation. It helps to identify deficiencies in national anti-corruption policies, prompting the necessary legislative, institutional and practical reforms. GRECO also provides a platform for the sharing of best practice in the prevention and detection of corruption.

Ukraine joined GRECO on January 1, 2006 by ratifying the Civil Convention of the Council of Europe against Corruption. 

The first evaluation visit of the organization’s experts to Ukraine was held in November of 2006 on the outcomes of which in March of 2007 there was approved the first Report about our state containing 25 recommendations.