The Venice Commission on Tuesday published an interim opinion on de-oligarchization bills from Georgia and Moldova, noting that instead of punishing specific individuals, both countries should focus on systemic reforms.
This is stated in the press releases of the Council of Europe.
As noted by the Venice Commission, Ukraine was the first country to adopt a special law on de-oligarchization, the obligation to eliminate the excessive influence of vested interests in economic, political and social life was also the subject of a special recommendation of the European Commission for Georgia and Moldova.
Since then, both countries have prepared similar draft laws: in the case of Georgia, Council of Europe experts characterized it as "very similar to the Ukrainian law", and in Moldova, the draft law was "inspired by Ukrainian legislation, but with some peculiarities".
The Venice Commission in both cases criticized the approach to de-oligarchization based on the so-called personal (punitive) approach, where oligarchs are defined using specific criteria such as wealth and media ownership.
"Such an approach, in the opinion of the Venice Commission, carries high risks of human rights violations and arbitrary application, which could potentially harm political pluralism," the interim conclusion regarding Georgia states.
At the same time, "Venetianka" emphasized some improvements in the Moldovan draft law in contrast to the Ukrainian and Georgian ones, which relate to "the involvement of the parliament and the judiciary in the procedure for determining the identity of an oligarch, as well as the presence of a list of basic rights to a fair trial in the procedure considered by the National Committee on de-oligarchization".
"The commission emphasized that de-oligarchization should be ensured through a systemic approach that has a preventive effect and targets numerous areas, such as media legislation, anti-monopoly legislation, political parties, elections, taxation, anti-corruption and money laundering, etc." d.", - is emphasized in both conclusions.
We will remind you that last week the Venice Commission was supposed to finally pass its opinion on the Ukrainian "anti-oligarchic" law. However, at the last moment, at the request of Ukraine, consideration of the law was postponed until at least the middle of the year. Although the essence of non-compliance of this law with the standards of the Council of Europe will not change.