A draft of the updated Civil Code of Ukraine (Code of Private Law) has been submitted for consideration by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. According to the explanatory note, the draft law is designed to promote Ukraine's integration into the European Union, but it contains norms that, if adopted, the fundamental rights of the child will be violated.
What's wrong?
The most blatant currently the norm of the project is a proposal for granting the right to register a marriage in the event of a woman's pregnancy or the birth of a child upon reaching the age of fourteen.
The Criminal Code of Ukraine defines sexual intercourse with a person under the age of 14 as rape, and 16 years of age as sexual intercourse with a person under the age of sexual consent.
Thus, a legal conflict arises, and marriage, in such a case, actually legalizes the consequences of a criminal offense, and can create a mechanism for avoiding criminal liability, as well as contradicts the principle of protecting the rights of the child.
Specified does not meet the requirements of the Lanzarote Convention and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, and is not consistent with the minimum standards of protection of the rights of the child that exist in democratic European countries.
In particular, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, in its recommendations to states, including Ukraine, stresses the need to eliminate ALL exceptions allowing marriage before the age of 18.
A similar norm is also reflected in the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.
We would like to emphasize that the solution to the problem of early pregnancies or the demographic crisis must be carried out EXCLUSIVELY by introducing mandatory sexual and reproductive health education for children, and not by actually legalizing sexual relations with children and registering child marriages in connection with girls becoming pregnant at such an early age!
National hotline for children and youth annually receives more than 5 thousand appeals from children, which relate to issues of sex education and reproductive health from children. At the same time, a significant part of them is accompanied by reports of fears after entering into sexual contact (not always voluntary or conscious), including fears so strong that they lead to self-harming behavior or the desire to commit suicide due to the hypothetical consequences of what has been done.
And the perception of relationships by adults at such an early age still remains extremely negative, provokes an increase in the level of domestic violence in such families and will in no way contribute to the observance of the rights and best interests of children, but will only deepen an already significant problem that already exists in Ukrainian society.
Public organization “La Strada-Ukraine” calls on the people's deputies of Ukraine to prevent the adoption of the new Civil Code of Ukraine in its current version, without eliminating the indicated gaps and direct violations of the rights of the child, and to provide the opportunity to submit the draft CCU for public discussion with the preliminary removal of the current version of the draft CCU from the agenda.
Українська