The Constitution guarantees an individual’s right to access a lawyer (Article 59). Ukrainian lawyers are meant to ensure the exercise of this right. Today, attorneys represent individuals and legal entities in courts and defend them in criminal proceedings (Article 131-2).

This provision of Article 131-2 of the Constitution, which introduced what is referred to as the attorney’s monopoly, is set to be revoked. Bill No. 1013, suggesting that the attorney’s monopoly be revoked, dated 29 August 2019 and introduced as a high priority to the Ukrainian Parliament by Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyi, has been referred to the Constitutional Court for obtaining its opinion on the same.

To learn about the rationale behind setting the attorney’s monopoly and aspects of the attorney’s job, and why the revocation of the attorney’s monopoly will undermine the government’s respect for the right to legal aid, please read a full article authored for the Law & Business Newspaper by Drozdova & Partners Law Firm Director Ms Olena Drozdova.