TORTURE AND ILL-TREATMENT OF CHILDREN IN UKRAINE

Section 1Analysis of legislation on prevention of torture and ill-treatment of childrenfully responsible for the preventive activity. Then the question arises: why is ita structural component of the MIA? As is known, art. 1 of the Law of Ukraine“On Militia” specifies that the militia is an armed public agency of executivepower that protects the life, health, rights and freedoms of citizens, property,environment, interests of society and state from illegal encroachments. Themain tasks of the militia identified by art. 2 of the same Law also include thetask of crime prevention. At present, the militia is rather a punitive authoritythan warning and prevention agency.Moreover, if we have a closer look at the proposed wording of art. 5 of theLaw of Ukraine “On agencies and services for children and special facilities forchildren”, we can see that the tasks of prevention unit are mostly limited toadministrative and punitive powers. The powers aimed at preventative measuresare featureless and as always lack an implementation mechanism.Specifically, the law establishes no requirements for qualification andspecial training of the personnel of the unit for crime prevention among children.Based on international experience and logic of reform of institutionsconcerned, it would be quite appropriate to formulate the requirements forthe presence of higher education or special training in the field of psychology,pedagogy or social activities of employees of the authorized unit for crimeprevention among children, and the presence of a positive experience ofworking with children.If the state adopts a conceptual decision to establish institutions of juvenilejustice, the work of such institutions must become professional and theyshould be separated from the purely punitive law enforcement. That is, theinitiated changes should lead to such definition of the status of the specialpreventive unit that its work is associated primarily with preventive measuresand that it does not duplicate punitive functions (there are other MIA unitsresponsible for this kind of activity). The personnel of this unit should zero inon prevention, adaptation of juvenile delinquents, their placement and protection.Otherwise the dominance of punitive functions of the unit and lackof additional requirements for qualification and experience will lead to theloss by this unit of all of preventive agency. And this body will turn from onefriendly to the child into another punitive division that will specialize in accuraterecords of juvenile offenders.Therefore, we consider that in determining the status, tasks and powersof the authorized agency for the prevention of delinquency among childrenin addition to the general provisions on preventive measures it is necessary to85