On November 24 and 25, 2023, the Roundtable “Judicial integrity and professional ethics: standards and practice of evaluation” was held in Kyiv. The High Qualification Commission of Judges of Ukraine was represented by the Secretary of the First Chamber of the HQCJ Ruslan Melnyk, and members of the Commission Vitalii Gatseliuk and Oleh Koliush.
Vitalii Gatseliuk, in his speech, expressed gratitude on behalf of the Commission for organizing the Roundtable and drew attention to the direct link between the Revolution of Dignity, the 10th anniversary of which Ukraine has recently celebrated, and the culture of integrity in the public service. This culture of integrity is introduced, in particular, by the improved judicial career procedures for which the Commission is responsible. He emphasized that with the qualification evaluation for the position of a judge having been reintroduced, the HQCJ seeks to make fair decisions based on a transparent and understandable procedure and takes effective institutional measures to ensure that its practice is sustainable and motivational.
The participants also discussed in detail a number of other important topics:
- relevant international and European standards, best practices and mechanisms for ensuring that judges and judicial candidates meet the criteria of integrity and professional ethics;
- the need for the introduction of amendments to the current legislation in order to formulate common approaches of different bodies to evaluating compliance of judges and candidates for the position of a judge with the criteria of integrity and professional ethics in the procedures of selection and qualification evaluation of judges;
- correlation between the concepts of judicial integrity and professional ethics in the context of their application as evaluation criteria for the purposes of selection of judicial candidates and qualification evaluation of judges;
- further steps in developing common indicators for evaluating compliance of judges and judicial candidates with the criteria of integrity and professional ethics.
Experts from the Council of Europe and the USAID “Justice for All” Program presented the results of an analysis of the practice of judicial bodies using integrity and professional ethics criteria in evaluating the compliance of judges, judicial candidates and members of judicial governance bodies in the procedures of judicial selection, competitions for vacant positions and qualification evaluation of judges.
The representatives of international projects and experts, in particular, the Chief of Party of the USAID “Justice for All” Program David M. Vaughn, the Project Manager of the Council of Europe “Support to the functioning of justice in the war and post-war period” Iryna Kushnir, the President of the European Network of Councils for the Judiciary Dalia Vasarienė, Dutch expert on psychological testing of judicial candidates Frank van Luijk and others took part in the event.
The Roundtable was also attended by members of the High Council of Justice, the Council of Judges of Ukraine, the Public Integrity Council, the Ethics Council, the Selection Commission, representatives of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, and the National School of Judges of Ukraine.
