The study from JurFem is dedicated to the analysis of women serving prison sentences. According to experts, Ukrainian legislation on serving prison terms is mostly gender-neutral regarding women and men.
Article 178 of the Labor Code provides for the right of pregnant women and women with children under the age of three to request that their employer reduce the woman’s production and service rates, or transfer her to easier work in order to avoid dangerous conditions while maintaining her pay from her original position. At the same time, the woman must provide her employer with an appropriate medical documentation confirming the pregnancy and the impossibility of performing the original work.
Article 179 of the Code of Labor Laws establishes that women shall be granted a paid maternity leave for 70 calendar days before childbirth and for 56 calendar days after childbirth, counting from the day of childbirth. A positive step in gender policy is the adoption of the Law of Ukraine 'On Amendments to Certain Legislative Acts Concerning Ensuring Equal Opportunities for Mothers and Fathers to Care for a Child'.
Article 56 of the Labor Code stipulates the employer's obligation to set part-time working hours for certain categories of employees, including (i) pregnant women; (ii) women with children under the age of 14 and/or a child with a disability; (iii) women caring for a sick family member. The scope of their labor rights is not limited; such women still have the right to a full-time vacation and social benefits. For part-time work days, a person is paid in proportion to the time worked. Article 60-1 provides for the right of pregnant women and women with children to choose to work from home.
Article 63 of the Code of Labor Laws prohibits overtime work for pregnant women and women with children under the age of three. This rule is meant to protect women, but at the same time it makes them vulnerable to discrimination. The direct application of this rule violates women's right to freely choose their work, restricts women's access to jobs for which additional payment is provided (for example, under the hourly payment system, overtime work is paid at doubled hourly rate), and can also inhibit women’s career and professional growth.
Domestic violence is a specific crime committed in the family or within the place of residence or between relatives, between former or current spouses, or between other persons who lived together as a family but were not related or married to each other, regardless of whether the perpetrator of domestic violence lived in the same place as the victim, as well as threats of such acts (also see the
The plaintiff filed a lawsuit with the Kyiv City Court against the defendant, the State Enforcement Service of Ukraine, to declare the order on his dismissal and reinstatement unlawful. The plaintiff argued that his dismissal was unlawful because he was not offered another position (as required by law in the event of a legal entity reorganization) and was dismissed during his social leave for childcare.
Spouses who have children may file to a competent court a divorce application supported by a written agreement detailing with whom the children will live following the divorce, to what extent the other parent will support the children, and the other parent's right to care for the children. The competent court shall award a divorce one month following the submission of the divorce application, if it is established that the divorce application is in line with the genuine intent of the wife and husband.
Articles 49, 50 of the Family Code of Ukraine refer the right to maternity and the right to parentage to the personal non-property rights of spouses. The term “maternity” means women’s legally guaranteed right to reproductive opportunity on (i.e., to give birth to children, raise them). The core of this personal non-property right is the wife's authority to decide whether or not to have a child. In addition, these articles establish that a woman's reluctance to have a child or her inability to conceive a child can be grounds for the dissolution of marriage.
The appellant went to court to deprive the defendant, her husband, of parental rights of their children. According to her, the defendant was not paying sufficient attention to the upbringing, health, and development of their child as well as failed to pay child support. Furthermore, there were conflicts between the spouses that had a negative impact on the child.
