Ukraine removes penalties for drug use itself

Ukraine removed drug use without a prescription from its administrative and criminal offences in a decree issued on 28 January 1991. It also ordered releases and shorter stays for people held in compulsory treatment institutions, while keeping separate penalties for possessing drugs.^[1]

Using and possessing drugs became different questions

The 1987 decree had put small personal possession and non-prescribed use together. An administrative penalty could mean a fine, corrective labour or, exceptionally, up to fifteen days’ arrest. Repeating either offence within a year after that penalty could lead to up to two years in prison.^[2]

The 1991 decree deleted the words covering use from both offences. Its change reached the administrative rule as well as the criminal rule for repetition. The remaining possession offence continued to cover keeping drugs without intending to sell them.^[1]

Signed by parliamentary chairman Leonid Kravchuk, the decree changed several laws governing compulsory treatment at the same time. For someone who used cannabis, punishment for holding the drug and punishment for having consumed it were now separate legal questions.^[1]

People held for more than a year were to be released

The decree ordered the release of people who had already spent more than one year in treatment-and-labour or treatment-and-education institutions. Longer orders for people who had spent less than a year there were to be shortened to one year.^[1]

It required those release and shortening provisions to be carried out within three months after commencement. Institution administrators were to issue the orders, with a prosecutor’s approval and agreement from the relevant local commissions.^[1]

For future compulsory treatment, the ordinary period was six months to one year. The revised law linked confinement to avoiding treatment or continuing non-prescribed use after treatment, together with systematic violations of public order or other people’s rights. It also provided court hearings, access to a lawyer and an appeal.^[1]

Compulsory treatment still had limits and exceptions

A court could extend confinement after systematic misconduct inside an institution when treatment and educational measures had failed, following medical evidence and the required official application. Total confinement could still reach two years.^[1]

The decree also removed the health-law sentence allowing compulsory hospitalisation for up to ten days when someone refused a drug-use examination. That power had appeared in the original 1987 text.^[1][2]

In 1995, parliament introduced a specific public-use crime, covering open or group use at specified venues and other crowded places. The Ukraine profile follows the later distinction between private consumption, public-use offences and possession.^[3]