Venice Commission warns Ukraine's HQCJ renewal draft preserves form but not substance
The Venice Commission and the Council of Europe's Directorate General of Human Rights and Rule of Law published an urgent opinion on 25 September on Ukrainian government draft law No. 16018-1, which governs how new members of the Higher Qualification Commission of Judges (HQCJ) and the High Council of Justice are selected. With nearly the entire current HQCJ composition's mandate expiring in June 2027 and no selection law in place, the Commission warned that the draft would reduce international experts' role to a nominal one and urged substantial revision.
Key points
- Nearly all current HQCJ members' mandates expire in June 2027; Ukraine has no law yet under which new members can be selected.
- On 25 September the Venice Commission and the Council of Europe's Directorate General of Human Rights and Rule of Law issued an urgent opinion on government draft law No. 16018-1.
- The Commission said the draft would 'preserve the form but not the substance' of Ukraine's European integration obligations.
- The Commission criticised the legislative process as not meeting standards of proper lawmaking, noting the draft was sent to it without prior public or parliamentary consultation.
- The Commission supported the core idea of entrusting the 2027 HQCJ renewal to a competition commission that includes international members.
- The Commission said involving international experts does not violate sovereignty and that required safeguards already exist in Ukrainian law.
- Under current legislation, future HQCJ compositions would be formed by national bodies alone, without international experts.
Why it matters
Without a new selection law, the entire current HQCJ cannot be renewed when its mandate expires in June 2027, threatening to halt judicial reform — a stated precondition for Ukraine's EU accession. Returning international experts to the competition commission is one of ten EU priority reforms under the Kachka–Kos plan and is tied to roughly 130 million euros in funding under the Ukraine Facility. The Venice Commission's criticism of both the draft's substance and the lawmaking procedure raises the prospect that the bill will require substantial revision before it can be adopted.
What happened
On 25 September 2026 the Venice Commission and the Council of Europe's Directorate General of Human Rights and Rule of Law published an urgent joint opinion on Ukrainian government draft law No. 16018-1, which concerns the selection of members of the Higher Qualification Commission of Judges (HQCJ) and the High Council of Justice. The Commission said the draft, in its current form, would reduce international experts' participation in the competition to a nominal role and preserve the form but not the substance of Ukraine's European integration obligations. It criticised the procedure by which the bill reached it, noting it had been transmitted on 10 July 2026 by then Vice Prime Minister Taras Kachka without prior public or parliamentary consultation, and said urgency does not remove the obligation to consult, including with civil society. The Commission nonetheless supported the draft's core approach of entrusting the 2027 HQCJ renewal to a competition commission that would again include international members, and reiterated that involving international experts does not violate sovereignty and that all necessary safeguards already exist in Ukrainian law.
How Ukrainian sources describe it
The single Ukrainian source frames the opinion through the pressure exerted by the EU and the Venice Commission to return to the pre-2025 mechanism that combined national and international members on the competition commission. It foregrounds the urgency created by the HQCJ mandate expiring in June 2027, the financial stakes under the Ukraine Facility, and the Commission's procedural criticism — that the draft was sent to the Council of Europe without prior public or parliamentary consultation — as part of a broader pattern in which Ukrainian legislation on the topic has stalled.
Background
Under current Ukrainian legislation, future HQCJ compositions would be formed exclusively by national bodies, without international experts. The first competition commission that selected the current HQCJ in 2023 had six members — three judges or retired judges from the Council of Judges and three experts from international organisations — and its term expired on 1 June 2025. On 18 June 2025, the head of the Verkhovna Rada's anti-corruption committee Anastasia Radina and other MPs registered draft law No. 13382 to extend international experts' participation, but the Verkhovna Rada never considered it. Nearly 90 civil society organisations called for preserving international experts in the competition commissions. The European Union included the return of international experts to the HQCJ competition in the ten-priority Kachka–Kos plan in December 2025 and later in the Ukraine Facility plan, tying the reform to roughly 130 million euros in funding. The government draft was sent to the Venice Commission on 10 July 2026 after seven months without movement on the EU priority.