TORTURE AND ILL-TREATMENT OF CHILDREN IN UKRAINE

Section 2Administrative standards and proceduresAlmost half of this document (not including definitions and applications)is given up to the section “Record keeping by the personnel of the CMM units”,indicating that these units deal mainly with the registration of children, whohave contact with the law. Also a considerable part of it is dedicated to theorganization and prevention of administrative and criminal offenses amongchildren.The participation of CMM units in investigation and search operations ismentioned only in §5.8 of Instruction in the context of criminal proceedingson the fact of a Missing Child.However, these units remain as part of the operational militia units ofthe MIA (because only such units in accordance with Article 5 of the Law ofUkraine “On the operational and search activities” are authorized to conductsuch activities), which specifies the primary concern of such units as a wholeas the fight against crime, i.e., identifying and exposing crimes. According toart… of this law the aim of investigation and search operations is “finding andfixing evidence of wrongful acts of individuals and groups, for which underthe Criminal Code of Ukraine ... in order to stop the crime and in the interestsof criminal justice, as well as obtaining information in the interest of publicsafety, society, and the state.”Accordingly, the structure (composition) of CMM units, despite the latestlegal regulation of their activities, essentially has to remain unchanged accordingto the chiefs’ manning table of the criminal militia working with minors,juvenile criminal militia also controlling drug trafficking, crimes relatedto trafficking in people, agencies of internal affairs, which count the time ofservice on concessional rate of one month of service for a month and a half(approved by the Order 22 ):department head, deputy head of department, squad commander, deputysquad commander, head of sector, deputy head of the sector, senior militiaoperative, militia operative, assistant militia operative.Obviously, the threat of cancellation of the preferential conditions of serviceis a major factor that prevents transferring the units working with children fromthe operative department to the social security department with the transferof the function of searching children to the criminal investigation units.The attempt to radically shift the emphasis in CMM units’ activity from“punitive” component to prevention without introducing appropriate organi-22 Order of the Ministry of Ukraine of 01.10.2007 No. 360.99