Article by the Agency for Legislative Initiatives for LB.ua
On 22 July 2025, the High Council of Justice (HCJ) announced the start of forming a new Selection Commission (SC) — the body responsible for appointing members of the High Qualification Commission of Judges (HQCJ). The HQCJ must complete the qualification assessment of sitting judges and fill more than two thousand judicial vacancies. It is precisely the High Qualification Commission of Judges that will determine how, and by whom, justice will be administered in Ukraine in the coming years — and potentially for decades to come.
In response to the HCJ’s announcement, the Council of Judges (CJU), the Council of Prosecutors (CPU), and the Bar Council of Ukraine (BCU) also declared the start of the candidate selection process. Under the current legislation, however, the SC will be formed without the involvement of international experts. Their mandate expired back on 1 June.
At present, the law stipulates that this path must be followed, yet past experience and public mistrust towards certain appointing bodies raise many questions. In particular, who will guarantee the quality and impartiality of the selection if it is carried out by representatives of unreformed institutions?
On 12 August, the High Council of Justice appointed the 16th member of the HQCJ — Ihor Kushnir, a retired judge of the Supreme Court. This leaves roughly a year to establish the Selection Commission, which will have to meet not only the requirements of the law, but above all the expectations of society.
What is Required from Members of the Selection Commission
It is vital to ensure a genuine and transparent review so that the selection does not become a mere formality allowing ‘convenient’ candidates to enter the Commission. The decisions of the Selection Commission will directly affect both the independence of the judiciary and the quality of its personnel. Therefore, its members must meet high standards of integrity, professionalism and independence and enjoy the trust of the public.
On 22 July, the High Council of Justice also approved the Methodology for the Assessment of Candidates. This is a comprehensive document covering the evaluation of reputation, professional experience, authority and integrity. At the initiative of HCJ member Roman Maselko, the procedure was supplemented with requirements to submit a declaration, a motivation letter and references. Yet this is only one of the prerequisites. Another safeguard must be the verification of candidates’ independence, namely the absence of conflicts of interest, ties to political forces, questionable decisions and the like.
Who Nominates — and Why It Matters
The new composition of the Selection Commission is now to be formed by four self-governing bodies: the Council of Judges, the Bar Council, the Council of Prosecutors and the National Academy of Legal Sciences. On paper, these are representatives of the legal community. In reality, however, some have long since discredited themselves in the eyes of the public.
For instance, the Council of Judges has repeatedly nominated individuals to selection bodies whose integrity was questioned by the public. Among them were the so-called ‘Maidan judges’ Volodymyr Kuzmenko and Yurii Triasun, as well as Yaroslav Romaniuk, the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Ukraine under Yanukovych. Moreover, the CJ itself requires renewal: since 2019, it has been headed by Bohdan Monich, who has also faced criticism from civil society.
Even more doubts surround the Bar Council. Its chair, Lidiia Izovitova — a long-time associate of state traitor Medvedchuk — has occupied the post for 13 years. The BCU’s mandate formally expired back in November 2022. Yet the congress of advocates, which should have renewed the Council’s composition, has never been convened, with the war cited as a reason. Instead, invoking institutional continuity, they unilaterally extended their mandate until the end of martial law — in direct breach of the Law on the Bar.
Notably, congresses of judges and prosecutors have been held repeatedly — even during the full-scale invasion.
Meanwhile, the congress of advocates has failed for more than three years to fill its quota of two vacant seats on the High Council of Justice.
Delegating candidates to the Selection Commission for the HQCJ, however, appears to be another matter: the BCU not only announced the start of the process, but completed it within just a couple of weeks.
Still, in both cases, the legitimacy of any actions by the BCU is highly questionable. The decisions of the unreformed Bar Council are like expired kefir: the packaging may remain intact in law, but its contents are extremely unsafe to consume.
Nevertheless, on 12 August, the BCU delegated three lawyers to the Selection Commission, claiming they had ‘impeccable reputations and public authority’. These were Oleksii Shevchuk, Hanna Kolesnyk and Oksana Kadenko. Do these claims reflect reality? Hardly. According to journalists, Oleksii Shevchuk has been implicated in high-profile cases: a corruption scheme involving the illegal departure of men abroad, and the disappearance of 10,000 military first-aid kits supplied from the United States worth over 33 million hryvnias. An inquisitive reader can also search for Shevchuk’s clients online — the list speaks for itself. The Qualification and Disciplinary Commission of Advocates of the Kyiv Region attempted to strip Shevchuk of his licence to practise law for violations of the rules of professional ethics. However, the decision was overturned, and Shevchuk went on to become the spokesperson of the Ukrainian National Bar Association (UNBA).
Kolesnyk and Kadenko are likewise closely connected to and dependent on the leadership of the NBAU and the Bar Council. At the initiative of the BCU and the UNBA, Hanna Kolesnyk was appointed Acting Head of the Bar Council of Kyiv in defiance of the law. Only advocates of the region are entitled to elect the Head of the city Council. Yet the BCU declared the elections to the Bar Council of Kyiv invalid and installed its own candidate — Kolesnyk.
Kadenko, for her part, has been a consistent critic of the Free Legal Aid system. She was elected to the Khmelnytskyi Regional Council from the regional branch of the political party All-Ukrainian Union ‘Batkivshchyna’ and is a member of the party’s council faction. This raises serious doubts about her political neutrality, which is crucial when selecting candidates for the HQCJ. Kadenko has also argued that to reform the Bar, it is necessary to abolish the two-term limit for holding offices, preferably to remove limits altogether. Such an approach contradicts both European standards and the basic logic of self-governance.
It seems that sitting judges or those in retirement are reluctant to risk their reputation by serving on a Selection Commission that includes delegates from the Bar Council. Sources in the CJU report that as of 18 August, only two individuals have submitted their applications, although at least six are required for the three vacant posts. The CJU will therefore likely extend the deadline for submissions.
The Bar Council has once again failed the test of maturity and cast doubt on the future composition of the Selection Commission, proving yet again that Ukraine is not ready, at this stage, to carry out selection and appointment to key positions without the involvement of international experts.
At the same time, this situation is further evidence that the reform of the Bar is overdue. Back in 2023, the European Commission stressed the need for this reform in Ukraine: ‘the self-governance system and resource management of the Bar should be improved and made more transparent and accountable. The qualification and disciplinary procedures for lawyers require significant improvements in law and in practice. The process for admission to the profession remains weak and prone to corruption risks, which undermines the credibility and independence of the profession’.
Proposals Exist; Decisions Do Not: What About Guarantees of Transparent Selection?
On the eve of the expiry of the mandate of international experts in the Selection Commission, more than 80 civil society organisations called on Parliament and the President to extend and preserve the involvement of foreigners in such commissions. In June 2025, MPs registered Draft Law No. 13382 to that effect. The authors propose at least three years of guaranteed international participation to ensure that the selection of HQCJ members does not degenerate into yet another behind-the-scenes arrangement for ‘insiders’. Judging by the judges’ reaction to the advocates delegated by the BCU, such concerns have already been borne out. After all, without the quota of the Council of Judges, the Selection Commission cannot function.
At present, Draft Law No. 13382 is under consideration by the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Legal Policy. For now, there appears to be neither a public hearing nor political will to advance it. However, MPs assure us that the draft law remains on the agenda. This was reported by representatives of Transparency International Ukraine, who attended a meeting of the Committee last week.
Moreover, on 31 July the spokesperson of the European Commission stressed the need to reinstate the participation of international experts in the Selection Commission with the right to a decisive vote. This is at least some clarity from the EU, as for quite some time it had maintained neutrality on the issue.
What Else Could Protect the Selection Commission from ‘Insiders’?
There remains a small chance of preserving the quality of selection even without the involvement of international experts. The formation of the Selection Commission must be open and transparent to society, and above all, independent. To achieve this, at least four things are needed:
- Clear criteria for assessing integrity and ethics — including checks not only of declarations, but also of participation in past competitions, positions in high-profile cases, ties to political forces and the like.
- Openness and independent monitoring — so that the public can see not only the formal questionnaires, but also how candidates are assessed by the HCJ, which will establish the SC.
- Delegation only of those whose legitimacy and reputation are beyond dispute. This means: no disciplinary sanctions, proven qualifications, no objections from the Public Integrity Council, and so forth.
- Considering the opinion of civil society when voting for the new composition of the Selection Commission. Candidates who raise substantiated doubts among the public should never be allowed to serve on any commission.
Otherwise, the selection process and the work of the Selection Commission will not meet the requirements of the EU or the expectations of the public.
At this stage of justice sector reform — and in light of the past two weeks of struggle for the independence of the SAPO and NABU — it has become abundantly clear that abandoning international experts in any of the selection commissions is far too premature. The candidates delegated by the Bar Council are yet another argument for why the participation of foreigners in selection bodies remains critically necessary.
Parliament should therefore adopt Draft Law No. 13382 without waiting for yet another prod from our European partners. That would demonstrate the agency of the Ukrainian Parliament on its path towards the EU.
