{"id":17269,"date":"2026-06-13T11:02:57","date_gmt":"2026-06-13T08:02:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/2026\/06\/draft-law-on-amendments-to-the-criminal-code-of-ukraine-regarding-the-improvement-of-liability-for-committing-criminal-offenses-against-the-environment-and-in-the-field-of-waste-management\/"},"modified":"2026-06-13T11:02:57","modified_gmt":"2026-06-13T08:02:57","slug":"draft-law-on-amendments-to-the-criminal-code-of-ukraine-regarding-the-improvement-of-liability-for-committing-criminal-offenses-against-the-environment-and-in-the-field-of-waste-management","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/2026\/06\/draft-law-on-amendments-to-the-criminal-code-of-ukraine-regarding-the-improvement-of-liability-for-committing-criminal-offenses-against-the-environment-and-in-the-field-of-waste-management\/","title":{"rendered":"Draft Law on Amendments to the Criminal Code of Ukraine regarding the Improvement of Liability for Committing Criminal Offenses against the Environment and in the Field of Waste Management"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Analysis of the draft law:<\/p>\n<h3>Substance of the draft law<\/h3>\n<p>This draft law is aimed at the systemic reform of the criminal legislation of Ukraine in the environmental sector and in the field of waste management. The draft law significantly strengthens criminal liability for crimes against the environment, increasing the amounts of fines and terms of imprisonment. The key novelty is the introduction of criminal law measures against legal entities for environmental offenses and lowering the threshold for the criminalization of acts \u2014 henceforth, liability will arise from the very fact of creating a danger to the environment or human health, without waiting for catastrophic consequences to occur.<\/p>\n<h3>Structure of the draft law and comparative analysis with the legislation in force<\/h3>\n<p>The draft law proposes amendments to the General and Special Parts of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (CCU). Its structure covers the modernization of the institution of liability of legal entities, as well as the restructuring of the main elements of environmental criminal offenses.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Subsidiary liability of business (Article 96<sup>3<\/sup> of the CCU):<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Before:<\/em> Measures of a criminal law nature could be applied to legal entities only for a limited range of crimes (corruption, terrorism, money laundering, etc.).<\/li>\n<li><em>Now:<\/em> The list of grounds has been expanded with a new paragraph 7 of part one and paragraph 5 of part two. Now companies will bear liability if their authorized persons have committed environmental crimes (Articles 236, 237, 239, 240, 241-243, 246, 268, and 268<sup>1<\/sup>), regardless of whether a specific individual is held liable.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Restructuring of the articles of the Special Part (Articles 236, 237, 239, 241, 242, 243, 268):<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Before:<\/em> Most environmental articles had a simple structure (one or two parts) and required proving the occurrence of grave consequences (loss of human life, mass illness) for qualification under more severe parts.<\/li>\n<li><em>Now:<\/em> A three-level structure of articles has been introduced:\n<ol>\n<li>Part 1 \u2014 creating a danger to human life, health, or the environment (crfenses with formal-material elements).<\/li>\n<li>Part 2 \u2014 commission of an offense repeatedly, by prior conspiracy by a group of persons, or causing &#8220;substantial damage&#8221;.<\/li>\n<li>Part 3 \u2014 causing the death of people, an environmental emergency, or other grave consequences.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Introduction of legal definitions (Note to Article 236 of the CCU):<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Before:<\/em> The terms &#8220;repeatedness&#8221;, &#8220;substantial damage&#8221;, and &#8220;grave consequences&#8221; in environmental articles were assessed subjectively or according to the methodologies of the relevant ministries.<\/li>\n<li><em>Now:<\/em> Criteria are clearly defined: &#8220;repeatedness&#8221; (prior commission of any of the environmental crimes); &#8220;substantial damage&#8221; (damage exceeding the non-taxable minimum income of citizens \u2014 NMIC \u2014 by 100 or more times); &#8220;grave consequences&#8221; (damage exceeding the NMIC by 200 or more times, or resulting in mass illness, extinction of flora\/fauna, etc.).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Waste management and transit (Articles 268 and 268<sup>1<\/sup> of the CCU):<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Before:<\/em> Article 268 punished the illegal import of waste and secondary raw materials primarily with fines of up to 100 NMIC.<\/li>\n<li><em>Now:<\/em> The title of the article has been changed to &#8220;Illegal import of waste into the territory of Ukraine or transit of waste&#8221;. The concept of &#8220;secondary raw materials&#8221; has been excluded. Fines have been increased to 200\u2013500 NMIC in Part 1, and for repeated commission or creating danger (Part 2), imprisonment from 5 to 10 years has been introduced. Article 268<sup>1<\/sup> regarding economic activity in hazardous waste management without a license has also been detailed.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Key Provisions Important for Target Audiences<\/h3>\n<p><strong>For business (industry, logistics, agricultural sector):<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Corporate liability:<\/strong> Legal entities become subjects of environmental control through the instrument of measures of a criminal law nature. If a top manager or an environmental officer of an enterprise violates safety rules or pollutes land\/water in the interests of the company, the enterprise may face a fine or even liquidation with confiscation of property.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Strict licensing of was\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/itd.rada.gov.ua\/billInfo\/Bills\/Card\/70202\"><strong>Full text by link<\/strong><\/a><\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Analysis of the draft law: Substance of the draft law This draft law is aimed at the systemic reform of the criminal legislation of Ukraine in the environmental sector and in the field of waste management. The draft law significantly strengthens criminal liability for crimes against the environment, increasing the amounts of fines and terms&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17269","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ukrainian-law-bills","pmpro-has-access"],"acf":{"patreon-level":0},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17269","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17269"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17269\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lexcovery.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}