The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) sided with former NABU Director Artem Sytnyk in the case of his inclusion in the public register of corrupt officials and recognized that this violated the former officialʼs right to a fair trial and respect for private life.
This is stated in the ECHR decision in the cases "Sytnyk vs Ukraine".
The court recognized that the judge in the domestic court was potentially dependent on the prosecutorʼs office, which could have influenced his procedural status in the parallel case, the guilty verdict was made without proper evidence, and Sytnykʼs inclusion in the register of corrupt officials for an indefinite period was a disproportionate interference in his private life.
ECHR also believes that the proceedings against Sytnyk could have been politically motivated, in particular as revenge for the NABU investigation into the son of the then Minister of Internal Affairs and the prosecutor in general.
Thus, the court decided that Ukraine violated the Convention and the decision may become a basis for compensation or review of the domestic decision.
Artem Sytnyk admitted that he had suffered material and non-material damage and legal expenses, but believed that the mere finding of a violation of the Convention was sufficient as compensation. The court agreed with this. Sytnyk was not awarded any payments.
Artem Sytnyk served as the director of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau from 2015 to 2022. In 2019, he lost his appeal in the Rivne Court of Appeal, and the court upheld the decision that Sytnyk was guilty of an administrative offense. This involved a vacation in the “Poliske-Sarny” hunting ground. According to the investigation, other people paid about 25 thousand hryvnias for this vacation, and Sytnyk did not indicate this information in his declaration.
Sytnyk pleaded not guilty, doubting the objectivity of the judge who heard the case. He was subsequently added to the register of persons who committed corruption or corruption-related offenses.
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