Under the existing laws the state guarantees appropriate payments and compensations for the participants of the anti-terrorist operation at the Eastern part of our country. In cases when the law is flouted professional legal advice will help.

The very option has chosen Mr. Oleksandr (the name is changed), Police Lieutenant Colonel, who took part in the anti-terrorist operation and has returned from the ATO zone home, to the native Khmelnytskyi Region. He has got to know that the counseling offices lawyers of the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union give cost-free advice on legal matters. After that he called in aid to Khmelnytskyi Regional Civic Organization “Podilska Pravova Liha” with the affiliated UHHRU counseling office.

The ATO participant needed help to receive payments and compensations, for which he had the right according to the law. After studying the situation the office lawyer Chrystyna Antoniuk has prepared the application to the Khmelnytskyi City Council and to the Regional State Administration to receive material assistance. Moreover the office lawyers have drawn up the application for the military man to receive land plots for construction and maintenance of a dwelling house, household outbuildings, and also the application to get a land plot for a garage. The letter of enquiry has been sent to receive information about free undeveloped land plots.

“It is no exception when ATO participants are not aware of their rights and privileges, that is why we help them. Our organisation provides legal information and advice, helps to draw up documents of the proceeding. We also prepare and distribute information booklets to cover the whole target audience and help as many combatants as we can. Besides we present the relevant information on our website and in my own blog on the newspaper “Vsim” (“To All”) site. The UHHRU counseling office in the city of Khmelnytskyi has been working for a rather short period of time (from May, 2015), during which 104 ATO participants applied to us”, tells Chrystyna Antoniuk,  lawyer of the Khmelnytskyi counseling office of the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union.

The happy end for Mr. Oleksandr came quickly. The answers came in a month. Mr. Oleksandr received information about land plots for an individual garage and he was queued on receiving land for a dwelling house. In the lawyers’ view the great achievement in this case is the consideration of Material Assistance Appeal by Khmelnytskyi Regional City Council. This issue has been already brought up for the commission of the Khmelnytskyi City Council Executive Committee on provision of one-time monetary aid for the ATO participants and their family members. We hope the decision to be for the benefit of ATO participant as well.