It is the prime minister and ministers who are empowered to shape the country's policy in relation to the occupied and de-occupied territories, the people who live there or were forced to flee from the war.. And nine months of war is enough time to not only prepare decisions, but also begin to implement them..

In this article, we analyzed the acts and actions of the Cabinet of Ministers during the invasion, which determine the country's policy towards people and territories affected by the war..

Looking for security and support.

After the liberation of part of the Ukrainian territories in the fall, the Ukrainian authorities faced a number of new humanitarian and economic challenges.. In the long term, the problem of restoring the affected communities, in the short term, the safe evacuation of residents, which was impossible during the occupation.

Back in October, the head of the Nikolaev OVA, Vitaly Kim, noted that in the de-occupied cities and villages of the region, they were already compiling lists of those wishing to be evacuated. And the relevant minister Irina Vereshchuk said that the state takes responsibility for moving, living, and medical care for migrants.. Those who decided to stay, the Ministry of Reintegration undertook to provide food, hygiene products, warm clothes and other essentials.

Residents of the de-occupied territories from November 1 are entitled to the same financial assistance as internally displaced persons from the occupied territories. We are talking about UAH 3,000 per month for children and persons with disabilities and UAH 2,000 for other categories.. To do this, the executive bodies of local councils, within seven days after the de-occupation, submit to the regional military administrations data on how many people lived at the time of de-occupation, and calculate the required amount.

The government also simplified the conditions for returning to Ukraine for citizens who had previously left the occupied territories abroad.. From now on, displaced persons have the opportunity to return to Ukraine without a passport, only with a birth certificate.. This is important for people who left the occupied territories in extreme conditions and did not have time or could not collect all the documents.

How to restore de-occupied territories?

Management of the de-occupied territories is another difficult process that the Ukrainian authorities should launch. On October 14, the government adopted a resolution on the development and discussion of programs for the comprehensive restoration of regions and territorial communities.

How exactly will the restoration of the region or community take place, the working groups from representatives of local councils, their executive bodies, representatives of public utilities should answer. Comprehensive recovery programs should include social economy, territory planning, infrastructure and environmental issues, urban planning and be based on the collected information about the destruction, demographic situation, the state of the local economy.

However, the big question is not only when the development of programs will begin, but also how high-quality the process will be.. Because the government approached the issue formally. For example, the participation of specialists in the development of programs for the restoration of territories is not mandatory - the decision to involve them is made by the regional state administration or the local council.. And members of the public can only submit proposals to the published draft, but not be part of the working group.

And most importantly, the government did not say a single word about what will happen next with the programs for the restoration of territories.. Will they be taken into account when allocating funds for restoration, or will they remain “abstracts on a free topic” written by communities. Moreover, we already have experience in creating a plan for the restoration of Ukraine under the auspices of the OPU, which resulted more in PR than in something real..

What to do with collaborators?

At the beginning of March 2022, people's deputies criminalized collaboration activities. Such is the public denial of aggression against Ukraine, voluntary employment in illegal government bodies, propaganda of aggression in educational institutions, transfer of resources to the occupiers, etc.. The police did not hesitate.

As of November, the SBU exposed more than 700 people as collaborators, the National Police opened more than 500 criminal cases, and the SBI — almost 150. More than 100 sentences of courts of first instance can already be found in the register of court decisions. And the media reports almost daily about the detention of a new collaborator. For example, for the expansion of the ruble zone in the Kherson region or the de-energization of the Donetsk region.

But many questions arose about the urgent and important initiative, which should punish the traitors and minions of the enemy..

Firstly, collaborationism actually repeats the composition of such crimes as high treason and encroachment on the territorial integrity of Ukraine, and this significantly complicates the work of law enforcement agencies.. Investigators and prosecutors now spend time pedantry to distinguish who is punished for high treason and who is for collaborationism.

This is understood by some people's deputies.. In the draft, which was supposed to correct the shortcomings of the current regulation, they point out that the new crime made it much more difficult to separate the crimes of high treason, collaboration, aiding the aggressor state and justifying Russian aggression against Ukraine..

Secondly, even those who do not directly cooperate with the occupiers or do it under duress or ensure critical infrastructure and the survival of people in the temporarily occupied territories are punished for collaborationism.. Criminal liability threatens businesses, doctors, firefighters, teachers, power engineers and other categories that support a normal life in the occupied communities. Tips and recommendations have already appeared on the network on how to behave in order not to fall under an article for collaborationism.

In response to this, the Ministry of Reintegration developed two bills that should protect certain types of activities from accusations of collaborationism. These documents are the overall result of the work of representatives of government, business, legal professionals and public organizations.. In early August, the Cabinet of Ministers submitted both documents to the Verkhovna Rada.

The first proposes to punish only voluntary entrepreneurship in cooperation with the aggressor or occupation authorities. In the second, members of the government determine what exactly business can do in the temporarily occupied territories so as not to be accused of collaborationism. These are, in particular:.

delivery and payment of pensions and cash assistance;

medical, social, funeral, banking (subject to restrictions), housing and communal services and transportation services;

educational activities without propaganda of aggression, the approval of the occupation administration or the implementation of the standards of the aggressor;

performance of work and provision of services, in particular in the field of trade and public catering;

activities in the field of electronic communications, radio frequency spectrum and the provision of postal services;

Agriculture.

But this list is too broad.. And the work of banks and the delivery of pensions to the occupied territories are generally absurd, because they allow the occupiers to stabilize the socio-economic situation, avoid sanctions and facilitate the retention of temporarily controlled territories. According to international humanitarian law, the aggressor is responsible for the functioning of the occupied territories, and helping him is nonsense..

Human rights activists note that the projects of the Cabinet of Ministers do not eliminate the main shortcomings of the current regulation - legal uncertainty, evaluative and vaguely defined concepts..

Since August, these bills have been in parliament with no particular prospects for adoption.. But with each settlement liberated from the invaders, this issue becomes more and more urgent.. Sooner or later, people's deputies and the government will have to make changes to the legislation in order to punish only real traitors, and not doctors or firefighters..

Is it possible to work in the occupied territories?

The large-scale invasion has posed another difficult question for the authorities, for which there are no simple answers.. How should authorities act in the temporarily occupied territories? How can they work under conditions of occupation? How to balance the interests of the state and citizens in the temporarily occupied territories?

The initiative of the Ministry of Reintegration, which the Cabinet of Ministers submitted to the parliament in August, was supposed to cope with this challenge.. Members of the government proposed that in the temporarily occupied territories state bodies and local self-government could work in the following areas:.

ensuring rights and freedoms, operational-search activities, pre-trial investigation, serving sentences;

medical care, the functioning of the fire service, the funeral service;

provision of housing and communal services;

protection of cultural values \u200b\u200band protection of the natural reserve fund;

restoration of territorial integrity.

But it will be difficult to implement this initiative.. The bodies of state power and local self-government of Ukraine cannot operate in the occupied territories, at least due to the fact that they are occupied. That is why international humanitarian law obliges the occupiers to maintain the temporarily occupied territories and population.

Moreover, the bill can contribute to the interaction between the occupation administrations and representatives of the official authorities of Ukraine, legalize their activities and help to gain a foothold in the territories controlled by the aggressor for a longer time.. In this form, the initiative threatens national security and is contrary to the interests of Ukraine..

Probably, the deputies understand this too.. Since August 10, the bill lies without any movement. Although the risk that sooner or later the parliament will begin to consider it, it still remains.

* * *.

The large-scale invasion posed many challenges for the country that needed to be resolved as soon as possible.. The government and people's deputies answered most of them, but not always successfully.

Evacuation, social support and assistance to residents of the de-occupied territories is, of course, the right decision of the Cabinet of Ministers. As well as the criminalization of liability for collaborationism.

But the fuzzy delimitation of this article from other similar articles, the same treason or encroachment on territorial integrity, created problems. And in fact, it led to the recognition as criminals of all those who are trying to support the functioning of the occupied cities. Government attempts to remedy the situation only exacerbate the problem..

War is a new experience for all of us. Those who have the power to make decisions must approach them very carefully.. " Otherwise, in an effort to solve one problem, you can create another, even bigger one..

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