Objects that have important national economic or defense importance as a mandatory feature of the composition of sabotage (problems of improving the current legislation)

Abstract

In their work, the authors highlight a complex of theoretical and practical issues related to the establishment of criminal liability for sabotage. The problem of using such outdated conceptual apparatus as objects of national economic or defense significance as part of sabotage is being investigated. It has been established that the term «national economy» is a rudiment of the terminology of the Soviet period, which needs to be excluded from the criminal legislation. Also, according to the authors of the work, the use of the evaluative sign «important value» as part of the crime complicates the understanding and enforcement of sabotage. The authors established that information services and electronic communications provide vital functions and services, the violation of which leads to negative consequences for the national security of Ukraine. This makes it possible to attribute the national mobile operators of Ukraine to critical infrastructure objects of the I criticality category, and the destruction or damage of their property to an act of sabotage.Based on the conducted research, the following ways of improving the criminal law are proposed: abandon the outdated terminology of the Soviet period as part of sabotage; on the basis of current legislation, propose the formulation of the subject of sabotage as objects of critical infrastructure; to recognize that it is inappropriate to use the evaluation sign «important» as part of sabotage; as a proposal, taking into account the requirements of the Law of Ukraine «On Critical Infrastructure», replace the evaluative characteristics of the subject of criminal encroachment as a basis for distinguishing a criminal act from a non-criminal act with a clear and understandable criterion of criticality of critical infrastructure objects, in accordance with Art. 10 of this Law.