CRIMINAL LIABILITY FOR COLLABORATION: GENESIS AND PROBLEMATIC ASPECTS OF LEGISLATIVE REGULATION IN UKRAINE IN MODERN CONDITIONS

Abstract

The war in Ukraine has become a severe test not only in the moral, ethical, cultural, national, economic and political dimensions, but also in the legal one. Practice has shown that the current legislation in general, and criminal law in particular, is not ready for the challenges of today. The problems of collaborationism, its concept, signs and types, which were considered during the Second World War, have become relevant again today. The genesis of criminal liability for collaboration has shown a change in the essence and form of this concept in historical retrospect.

Since the declaration of Ukraine's independence and until the Russian invasion in 2014, the issues of collaborationism and collaboration activities have not been the subject of separate legal (especially criminal) research. Obviously, the impetus for the start of these studies was the occupation of part of the territory of Ukraine. At the same time, in Ukraine, the phenomenon of collaborationism is still insufficiently studied in legal science.

Due to the fact that in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, collaboration in its various manifestations and forms has become a real threat to the security of our state, the Law of Ukraine No. 2108-IX of 03.03.2022 supplemented the Criminal Code of Ukraine with a new Article 111-1 "Collaboration". The number of registered criminal offenses under Art. 111-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine has been growing rapidly since the enactment of this article.

The paper highlights the problem of ambiguity in the interpretation of the concept of collaboration, due to the fact that it is very difficult to draw a clear line between the actions necessary to survive the occupation and voluntary purposeful cooperation with the enemy. The author identifies the problematic aspects of legislative regulation of criminal liability for collaboration in Ukraine in the current context and proposes several ways to address them.

Given that collaborationism harms the national security of Ukraine and poses a direct threat to the State sovereignty, territorial integrity, constitutional order and other national interests of Ukraine, the amendments to Article 111-1 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine are appropriate and justified.