Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) revoked the access to state secrets for Supreme Court judge Kravchuk

Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) revoked the access to state secrets for Supreme Court judge Kravchuk

Volodymyr Kravchuk, a judge of the Cassation Administrative Court within the Supreme Court and a member of the Council of Judges of Ukraine, has lost access to state secrets. At the initiative of the Security Service of Ukraine, he was removed from cases involving physical and legal entities subject to sanctions.

This was reported by the Legal Judicial Newspaper. The matter concerns the case filed by LLC "Probike Plus," which has been under review since 2021. The company sought to declare illegal and annul President Volodymyr Zelensky’s decree of April 21, 2021, which imposed sanctions against it for 3 years.

The restrictions against the LLC were initiated by the Security Service of Ukraine. Investigators established that the company was involved in smuggling goods to the "L/DNR" and financing terrorism. Therefore, they appealed to the National Security and Defence Council with the relevant request.

In June 2024, a panel of judges of the Supreme Court’s Cassation Administrative Court fully satisfied the claim of LLC "Probike Plus" and declared the president’s decree illegal. However, the Security Service of Ukraine appealed this decision to the Grand Chamber of the Supreme Court, which has not yet issued a final decision on the dispute.

Judge Volodymyr Kravchuk, who presided over the session, was removed from considering "sanction" cases. On September 16, 2024, the Security Service of Ukraine canceled Judge Volodymyr Kravchuk’s access to state secrets, and then the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Stanislav Kravchenko, terminated his access to classified information.

Kravchuk commented on the situation, pointing out the risks: "Colleagues may perceive the revocation of my access to state secrets as a clear demonstration of the Security Service of Ukraine’s influence on judges, as a warning to imprudent judges. If these risks are not eliminated, there is a possibility that a panel of judges in the Supreme Court will emerge, supporting the Security Service of Ukraine, who will be granted (or extended) access to state secrets. Other judges will be disqualified from considering such cases."

The publication called this situation a dangerous precedent, as the problem also lies in the fact that the Security Service of Ukraine found a way to disqualify a judge from cases. The revocation of access to state secrets not only deprives a judge of the opportunity to consider certain categories of cases but also renders him unofficially labeled as "unreliable."