Ukraine Report-2007

Here is the same summary, notable is a number of hate crimes that took place.

Academic freedom issues

The government did not restrict academic freedom, but academic freedom was an underdeveloped and poorly understood concept. Most major universities were state owned; while university rectors had a degree of autonomy; curriculum and degree standards were tightly controlled by the Ministry of Education. Administrators of universities and academic and research institute directors could silence colleagues by denying the ability to publish, withholding pay and housing benefits, and directly terminating them.

General human rights issues:

Most issues revolved around the police and the penal system. There were instances of torture by police, unjustified detention, and military hazing. It is alarming to see a number of hate crimes against Jews and non-Slavic persons. In matter of fact, the government began to acknowledge the problem of ethnically-motivated attacks, creating special crime units at the Ministry of Interior (MOI) and Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and establishing a new position of ambassador-at-large to combat racism, xenophobia and discrimination at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs; the country’s first hate crime trial was begun in February, and three assailants were charged with a hate crime and one with murder for the October 2006 killing of a Nigerian in Kyiv.

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