Генеза вітчизняного законодавства про кримінальну відповідальність за державну зраду

Abstract

The article analyses the historical aspect of criminal liability for high treason in Ukraine since the times of Kyivan Rus’. The genesis of the emergence and transformation of this legal phenomenon is studied on the material of the statutes of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the codified criminal laws of the Russian Empire, the criminal codes of the Soviet era. It is noted that all the criminal codes of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic were not proper domestic laws. They were created in strict accordance with the instructions of the central authorities of Moscow, which were based on the principle of political expediency. In fact, these norms of the Ukrainian criminal legislation were copied from the Criminal Code of the RSFSR. Therefore, in Ukraine in the 1920s and 1950s the concept of «counter-revolutionary crimes» was introduced into criminal law. A relevant chapter of the Criminal Code was created, which included high treason. As a result, the ideas of class struggle became the norms of criminal law and were used as an instrument of political repression. Based on the study, it was concluded that it is necessary to improve the current criminal legislation of Ukraine, taking into account the historical experience of criminal responsibility for high treason and in accordance with modern threats to the national security of Ukraine.