DISCUSSION OF LEGISLATIVE INITIATIVES TO DECRIMINALISE SEX WORK AND DESTIGMATISE SEX WORKERS IN UKRAINE CONTINUES

On October 13, 2023, at the initiative of CO "Legalife-Ukraine" and ”Fight for Health” Platform of CO "100% Life" a round table "Legislative initiatives of the platform "Fight for Health" in the area of combating HIV  and Ukraine’s acquisition of EU candidate status" was held.

The meeting of partners and representatives of sex worker community was dedicated to discussing the developed legislative initiatives in the field of decriminalisation of lifestyles and destigmatisation of sex workers, as well as identifying ways to advocate for their implementation in Ukrainian legislation.

Before discussing possible approaches to legislative changes and ways to implement them, Natalia Isaieva (Наталія Ісаєва), Director of CO "Legalife-Ukraine", outlined the consequences of criminalisation and the main problems faced by sex workers in Ukraine.

According to the results of an assessment of the needs of SWs in war conditions in 2022-2023, conducted by the sex worker community, the number of SWs facing violations of their rights continues to grow. Thus, before the war, 56% of SWs faced violations of their rights; in the second year of the war – 62% of SWs.

The most common types of violations are

• blackmail/coercion to cooperate by the police - 18 per cent of the respondents
• refusal to accept a statement to the police - 9%,
• denial of medical and social services - 29%,
• refusal or delay in the process of applying for social benefits - 19%.
• extortion of charitable monetary contributions for the opportunity to receive medical services – 23%.

Over the past six months, 15% of SWs have experienced three or more violations of their rights (up to 6).

Natalia suggested that in fact even more of them face restrictions and violations of their rights, as almost, as 18% of SWs do not understand what exactly constitutes human rights violations and when they are entitled to protection. For example, in this survey, SWs who indicated that they had not experienced a violation of their rights, in answers to the following questions, spoke about abuses of power by officials (police, medical and social workers) or employers and other gross violations of human rights that have occurred in relation to them.

It is worrying that 25% of the affected SWs did not seek help because they did not believed in a positive outcome of the cases, or because they did not trust lawyers or lacked funds.

Due of their illegal status, 8% of the affected persons were unable to receive state assistance (based on the results of the study of the situation in the field of social protection, protection of SRHR (Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights)  and SWs access to such services in conditions of war, 2023). This often happens because in order to receive cash payments from the state, it is necessary to comply with the norms of documentary confirmation by the acquirer of the right to receive them, which formally exclude the SWs from this list. Namely, in order to receive assistance for low-income families and single mothers, a potential acquirer must provide social services with certificates of employment/family members over 18 years of age. Obviously, SWs cannot provide such a certificate because sex work is not a job, and SWs are not officially employed.

Natalia also noted that bureaucracy and formalism in social services and other state institutions prevent sex workers from receiving services and assistance. They talked about the large number of documents that need to be submitted to state services, the unclear procedures of registration, the lack of interest of state services to help people and the lack of motivation of social workers to resolve the issue positively. All this leads to formal performance of their duties and the lack of individual approach to the problems of a particular person.

But the main obstacle remain the stigmatizing attitude and discrimination faced by 60% of SWs from social workers, health workers and civil servants. This is especially true for SWs who belong to cross-groups: PLWD (People living with drug addiction), PLWH and ex-prisoners, because they have special external signs, behavioral differences, problems with documents and cannot hide their status.

According to the program of the event main speakers of the event were:

Oksana Kashintseva (Оксана Кашинцева) - coordinator of the legal group of the Platform "Fight for Health" CO "100% Life", candidate of legal sciences, lawyer. She reviewed policies and advocacy in the field of decriminalization and elimination of stigmatization of sex work.

Anastasia Serbina (Анастасія Сербіна) - consultant of the Platform "Fight for Health" CO "100% Life", a lawyer. She spoke about the practices of the ECHR (European Court of Human Rights)  in the field of respect for private life and decriminalization of sex work.

Nataliya Gutorova (Наталія Гуторова) - consultant of the Platform "Fight for Health" CO "100 % Life", doctor of law, academician. She presented legislative initiatives in the field of decriminalization of sex work for discussion.

Iryna Yakovets (Ірина Яковець) -consultant of the Platform "Fight for Health" CO "100% Life", doctor of Law. She spoke about the expediency of the impact of punishment or administrative sanctions on sex workers.

The participants discussed the achieved advocacy results in the field of HIV prevention and the decriminalization of sex work at the level of registered draft laws.

In particular: the universality of coverage in access to HIV prevention, testing and treatment is ensured, discriminatory terminology is eliminated, namely, "a person infected with HIV" is replaced by "a person , who lives with HIV", the monopoly position of state and communal institutions in the provision of medical care in the field of HIV is eliminated, the possibility of HIV testing for non-governmental organizations and others is provided.