(Bloomberg) -- The European Union urged Ukraine to “rapidly restore” legislation on electronic asset declarations after the country's Constitutional Court struck down key anti-corruption measures in a blow to the country's efforts to restore the flow of foreign aid.
The former Soviet state should also “stabilize” the legal status of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau by Dec. 16 after the top court also ruled in August the appointment of its head was illegal.
The court's decision “has far-reaching consequences for the whole anti-corruption infrastructure in Ukraine” and “calls into question a number of international commitments that Ukraine assumed in relation to its international partners, including the EU,” the European Union's diplomatic service said in a statement on Tuesday.
Ukraine is struggling to win approval for the next tranche of a $5 billion International Monetary Fund loan just as daily Covid-19 infections hit record highs.
Backsliding on anti-graft efforts could also endanger Ukraine's visa-free regime with the EU. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is at standoff with the Constitutional Court and is demanding that parliament approve a bill to dismiss judges on the constitutional tribunal, a move that itself breaches laws. No date is set yet for lawmakers to debate it.
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