Problem aspects of military pay suspension

Abstract

The rapid increase in the personnel of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU) and the sums of military pay in the period from 2014 to 2024 have caused a proportional increase in violations of the payments, especially when unreasonable payment is made due to the late issuance of the order on military pay suspension by the commander (chief). The application of dialectical formal-logical, systemic-structural and formally dogmatic methods established that the suspension of the military pay in the case of a military serviceman’s AWOL of a military unit (place of service) is the result of its suspension is impossible until the court plaid him guilty under the relevant part of Art. 407 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, or serviceman’s acquittal, or the terminating of criminal proceedings on rehabilitative grounds. The analysis of the current legislation, which regulates the military pay in the AFU, established that the reason for such violations is the inconsistency of peacetime legislation with the circumstances of a full-scale invasion, in particular, the establishment of the fact that a serviceman voluntarily left a military unit (place of service) only from the moment the commander (chief) of the serviceman turned to law enforcement authorities with a notification of the commission of a criminal offense with a mandatory preliminary official investigation. In order to avoid unjustified payments of financial support for the period between the establishment of the fact of the military serviceman’s AWOL and the suspension of the servicemen’s military service due to AWOL, it is proposed to postpone the moment of suspension of the military pay from the moment of submitting an application to the law enforcement authorities on the fact of committing by the military serviceman of the criminal offense provided for in Art. 497 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine at the time of establishing the fact of the AWOL of a serviceman in a military unit (at the place of service).