Beyond the prosecutor's office: what the European Commission overlooked

European Pravda has received a response column to an article on the EU’s vision for reforming Ukraine’s Prosecutor’s Office from former Deputy Prosecutor General of Ukraine, Gunduz Mamedov.

We are publishing it in the hope of fostering further discussion on this issue, which is of utmost importance for Ukraine.

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Today, European Pravda has published an article by Sergiy Sydorenko on the need to reform the prosecutor’s office as part of Ukraine’s path toward the EU.

As someone who worked in the prosecutorial system for many years, I have seen how each new "reform" changed the nameplates on office doors but hardly altered the underlying logic of how the system operates.

I therefore consider it necessary to add another perspective to this discussion. The problem truly exists, it is deeply felt, and it has become one of the focal points of the European Commission’s report.

The requirements and recommendations of the European Commission are undoubtedly well-founded and essential to Ukraine’s European integration. At the same time, the formal implementation by Ukraine of individual recommendations, without a coherent institutional vision, is unlikely to deliver the expected results.

These recommendations should be understood as a roadmap rather than a ready-made model.

Responsibility for designing and implementing an effective, coherent institutional architecture therefore rests with the Ukrainian state itself.

This discussion goes far beyond any single institution and concerns the effectiveness of the entire system of law enforcement and justice. Today, the problem is not so much about the "excessive power of the prosecutor’s office" as it is about the erosion of governability across the system as a whole.

This is the core issue. In the absence of a shared logic, clearly defined roles, and transparent accountability, no institution can be effective, regardless of the scope of its formal powers.

It is also worth recalling that since 1996, when the Constitution of Ukraine was adopted, the prosecutor’s office has been in a state of permanent reform. During this time, several waves of changes have been implemented – affecting functions, status, selection procedures and more.

Yet none of these reforms, unfortunately, has led to genuine institutional transformation or to the long-needed "turning point" required to build a stable and predictable operational model.

Reforms of the prosecutor’s office are indeed necessary. However, imitation of reform is more dangerous than its absence. It creates an illusion of progress while the system remains stagnant and, at the same time, removes political responsibility for results. In this logic, competitive selection procedures are merely one tool, not a universal solution.

The absolutisation of competitions is a typical approach of our partners, and it is understandable why this happens. Yet it is important to recognise that competitions alone guarantee neither independence nor effectiveness, and they certainly cannot replace thoughtful institutional design.

The same applies to prosecutorial self-governance, which I can also assess from personal experience. In practice, it has produced virtually no results, as it failed to lead to a real redistribution of power.

Self-governance became a convenient façade behind which the old system continued to operate.

That is precisely why it is now critically important for the focus of reform to finally shift away from individual names or personal decisions and toward institutional capacity.

This approach allows us to speak not about personal responsibility in a narrow sense, but about the system’s ability to function in a predictable, coordinated, and effective manner – and to have real safeguards against political or personal interference.

In this context, a much more constructive discussion concerns the functional role of the prosecutor’s office.

I have repeatedly argued that coordination should be among its key tasks. Instead, today each agency effectively lives its own life: operating under separate plans, shaping its own information policy, and acting outside a common framework of state criminal justice strategy. Under such conditions, it is extremely difficult to speak of system coherence or effectiveness.

Reforming the prosecutor’s office without real transformations in the judiciary, without effective accountability of investigative bodies, and without a clear criminal policy model turns into a mere shifting of responsibility onto a single institution. This does not solve the problem. It conceals it.

The most dangerous mistake in this situation is to focus on isolated, piecemeal decisions and create the illusion of change while failing to make the prosecutor’s office a true center of coordination within the law enforcement system.

In the context of war and persistent corruption risks, the state needs not symbolic gestures but systemic solutions.

An isolated reform of the prosecutor’s office cannot transform the system as a whole.

The prosecutor’s office cannot be an "island of order" in an ocean of chaotic, uncoordinated institutions and decisions.

Without a shared logic of responsibility, the entire criminal justice system will remain vulnerable – regardless of the number of formally proclaimed reforms.

Publications in the Expert Opinion section are not editorial articles and solely reflect the author's point of view