Capital punishment Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...

was abolished in

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

in 2000.Serial killer Onopriyenko dies in Zhytomyr prison

Interfax-Ukraine The Interfax-Ukraine ( uk, Інтерфакс-Україна) is a Kyiv-based Ukraine, Ukrainian independent news agency founded in 1992. The company does not belong to the Russian news corporation Interfax Information Services. The company pub ...

(28 August 2013) In 1995 Ukraine entered the

Council of Europe The Council of Europe (CoE; french: Conseil de l'Europe, ) is an international organisation founded in the wake of World War II to uphold European Convention on Human Rights, human rights, democracy and the Law in Europe, rule of law in Europe. ...

and thus it was obliged to abolish the death penalty. The

Verkhovna Rada The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine ( uk, Верхо́вна Ра́да Украї́ни, translit=, Verkhovna Rada Ukrainy, translation=Supreme Council of Ukraine, Ukrainian abbreviation ''ВРУ''), often simply Verkhovna Rada or just Rada, is the ...

introduced amendments to the then-acting

Criminal Code A criminal code (or penal code) is a document that compiles all, or a significant amount of a particular jurisdiction's criminal law. Typically a criminal code will contain offences that are recognised in the jurisdiction, penalties that migh ...

in 2000, according to which “death penalty” was withdrawn from the list of official punishments of Ukraine. Ukraine carried out its last execution in 1997 according to

Amnesty International Amnesty International (also referred to as Amnesty or AI) is an international non-governmental organization focused on human rights, with its headquarters in the United Kingdom. The organization says it has more than ten million members and sup ...

History

Capital punishment in Ukraine existed soon after the fall of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

in 1917. Among the list of known people who were executed by the Ukrainian authorities was Ivan Samosenko. In 1995, Ukraine entered the

and one of the obligations it had to undertake with this act was to abolish the death penalty.International Actors, Democratization and the Rule of Law: Anchoring Democracy?

Routledge Routledge () is a British multinational publisher. It was founded in 1836 by George Routledge, and specialises in providing academic books, journals and online resources in the fields of the humanities, behavioural science, education, law, and ...

, 2008, (page 196 a.f.) The

undertook little actions to do so until September 1998 after international pressure from the Council of Europe and the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...

. At the request of the People's Deputies of Ukraine, the

Constitutional Court A constitutional court is a high court that deals primarily with constitutional law. Its main authority is to rule on whether laws that are challenged are in fact unconstitutional, i.e. whether they conflict with constitutionally established ...

ruled the death penalty unconstitutional in December 1999. The Verkhovna Rada introduced amendments to the then-acting

in April 2000 that withdrew capital punishment from the list of official punishments in Ukraine (in peace and wartime).The Death Penalty: Beyond Abolition

, 2004, (page 74) Ukraine was the last Council of Europe member state that used to be part of the

Eastern Bloc The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc and the Soviet Bloc, was the group of socialist states of Central and Eastern Europe, East Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America under the influence of the Soviet Union that existed du ...

to abolish the death penalty for peacetime offenses. Latvia, also a former Soviet republic, abolished it for wartime offenses only in 2012.

Politics

National Corps The National Corps ( uk, Національний корпус, Natsionalnyi korpus), also known as the National Corps Party, and previously called the Patriots of Ukraine, is a far-right political party in Ukraine founded in 2016 and then led by ...

, a Ukrainian far-right political party, supports bringing back the death penalty.

Reintroduction in Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics

The

Donetsk People's Republic The Donetsk People's Republic ( rus, Донецкая Народная Республика, Donetskaya Narodnaya Respublika, dɐˈnʲetskəjə nɐˈrodnəjə rʲɪˈspublʲɪkə; abbreviated as DPR or DNR, rus, ДНР) is a Territorial ...

, a Russian occupied, partially recognized

breakaway state Breakaway or Break Away may refer to: Film, television and radio * ''Breakaway'' (1955 film), a British film * ''Breakaway'' (1990 film), an Australian film featuring Deborah Kara Unger * ''Breakaway'' (1996 film), an American film featuring T ...

in territory internationally recognized as part of Ukraine, introduced the death penalty in 2014 for cases of treason, espionage, and assassination of political leaders. There had already been accusations of

extrajudicial execution An extrajudicial killing (also known as extrajudicial execution or extralegal killing) is the deliberate killing of a person without the lawful authority granted by a judicial proceeding. It typically refers to government authorities, whether ...

s occurring. The

Luhansk People's Republic The Luhansk or Lugansk People's Republic (russian: Луга́нская Наро́дная Респу́блика, Luganskaya Narodnaya Respublika, ; abbreviated as LPR or LNR, rus, ЛНР) is a disputed entity created by Russian-backed ...

, which is also a partially recognized secessionist breakaway state in what is widely recognized as Ukrainian territory, has also reintroduced capital punishment. On June 9, 2022, following the

siege of Mariupol The siege of Mariupol began on 24 February 2022 and lasted until 20 May 2022, as part of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. It saw fighting between the Russian Armed Forces (alongside the Donetsk People's Militia) and the Ukrainian Armed F ...

during the

Russian Invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, which began in 2014. The invasion has resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides. It has caused Europe's largest refugee crisis since World War II. An ...

, British volunteers to Ukraine

Aiden Aslin Aiden Aslin (; born in 1994) is a British-born dual citizen of the United Kingdom and Ukraine who was captured by Russian forces in April 2022 while fighting as a Ukrainian Marine in Mariupol. He was sentenced to death on 9 June by authorities ...

and Shaun Pinner, and Moroccan Brahim Saadoun were sentenced to death for "terroristic activities" in a proceeding widely described as a

show trial A show trial is a public trial in which the judicial authorities have already determined the guilt or innocence of the defendant. The actual trial has as its only goal the presentation of both the accusation and the verdict to the public so th ...

; however, they were later released in a POW exchange between Ukraine and Russian authorities. The Ukrainian government, which does not recognize the independence of these republics, has threatened to prosecute anyone involved in such executions for murder.Kyiv Authorities Slam Separatist Courts Handing Down Summary Death Sentences
/ref>

References

External links

{{Capital punishment in Europe Human rights abuses in Ukraine Law of Ukraine Death in Ukraine 2000 disestablishments 1997 disestablishments 1995 disestablishments