European Union - EEAS (European External Action Service) | The EU expects President Yanukovych not to sign the recently adopted public procurement law

The EU expects President Yanukovych not to sign the recently adopted public procurement law (12/03/2010)

The European Union expects Ukrainian President Yanukovych to veto the respective law. After carefully studying it, EU experts came to the conclusion that this law, adopted by Verkhovna Rada on 11 February 2010, is not fully in line with European standards. These concerns were communicated, jointly with the World Bank, to the Presidential Administration.

Main concerns not in line with EU standards raised by EU experts are:

• the adopted scheme of the appeals review mechanism does not meet key EU requirements of the impartiality and independence - this leads to corruption;

• excessively burdensome procurement procedures and too many sectors escape the application of the law - this undermines the transparency

Background note:

Ukraine and the EU have jointly adopted the list of priorities of mutual cooperation for 2010 on 26 January 2010. The points 26 and 27 mention concrete commitments of Ukraine to work towards harmonisation of public procurement legislation. This document also refers to specific EU legal acts (Directives 2004/17, 2004/18 and 2007/66) that Ukraine should align with.