Experts: State efforts to combat discrimination insignificant

The Roma people, homosexuals, persons with disabilities, and displaced persons are the most discriminated groups in Ukraine. Women and HIV-positive people also often suffer from discrimination. Moreover, discrimination based on language and religion is not uncommon.

This is stated in the report “On the Edge: Combating Discrimination and Inequality in Ukraine.”

Despite the fact that Ukraine adopted the law on combating discrimination and the relevant decisions were introduced, the situation in Ukraine remains critical, actually being “on the edge”. Expert at the Our World human rights LGBT Center Andriy Kravchuk said this to the Human Rights Information Centre correspondent.

“Our state does not fulfill the role of locomotive in solving the discrimination problems, it is rather a trailer. A lot of factors, including the EU-Ukraine Association Agreement and terms of the plan to simplify the visa regime, encourage the government to solve this problem. This alone makes the authorities move forward,” representative of the Secretariat of the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights Serhiy Ponomarev comments on the current situation.

According to the experts, the situation will not change until there are thousands of lawsuits for discrimination in Ukraine.

Thus, Dr. Dimitrina Petrova, the executive director of the Equal Rights Trust international organization, notes there are few precedents and little court practice on discrimination cases in Ukraine: “Either the plaintiffs have no motivation, or it is very expensive, although the court procedure should be free. The judges and lawyers themselves, probably, have not yet realized that discrimination cases are very serious. The anti–discrimination legislation is ineffectively introduced in Ukraine…”

According to the expert, there would be no need in teaching law classes in school, if children saw the force of law in practice.

In turn, Tamara Martseniuk, social scientist, professor at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy, notes there is request for Human Rights as optional subject among the students.

“However, such disciplines are mostly grass-roots initiatives of individual professors, while the education should have a systematic approach,” Martseniuk notes.

The report comprises testimonies of victims of discrimination with statistical and other information, and provides in-depth coverage of discrimination and inequality problems. As the experts comment, some testimonies are very difficult to collect.

Olena Vynohradova, expert of the project “Advocacy, Protection, and Legal Assistance to Internally Displaced Persons in Ukraine”, says that the internally displaced persons (IDPs) often suffer multiple discrimination. They have limited freedom of movement, the employers do not hire them only because of place of registration: “A lessor may refuse to lease apartment, saying that the IDPs will not able to be pay the rent, or because he or she dislikes them being displaced persons, or offers them higher rental price. However, it’s impossible to prove these facts. Our monitors collect these data informally.”

The report was prepared by the Our World human rights LGBT Center, with the participation of the Equal Rights Trust international organization and the Coalition for Combating Discrimination with financial support of the European Commission.