CIVICUS discusses Ukraine’s recent anticorruption protests with Oksana Huss, co-founder of the global Interdisciplinary Corruption Research Network and board member of Transparency International Ukraine, one of the country’s major anticorruption organisations.
Ukraine witnessed its first major protests since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in 2022 when parliament moved to weaken key anticorruption institutions. Civil society responded immediately: activists and watchdog groups took to the streets in Kyiv, the capital, and other cities, with protests gaining momentum despite ongoing Russian missile attacks. Following several days of sustained public pressure, international criticism and European Union (EU) threats to freeze funding, parliament reversed course and voted to restore the agencies’ independence. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed the reversal into law the same day, marking a defeat for what protesters saw as an attempted power grab.
