Issue of criminal liability for offences against critical infrastructure objects in nuclear industry

Abstract

A special legislation on criminal liability for offences against critical infrastructure objects is currently under development in Ukraine. The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine adopted the Concept for the development of a state system for critical infrastructure protection.
 The paper considers this legal area with regard to objects in the nuclear industry in the general context of critical infrastructure protection. It provides the current state in the legal regulation of fundamentals of criminal liability for offences against the critical infrastructure objects in the nuclear industry. The issue on the sufficiency and appropriateness of the existing level of such a liability is discussed further.
 The paper presents the list of some main critical infrastructure objects in accordance with the regulatory documents in the sphere of critical infrastructure protection and their classification.
 In addition, such concepts as “critical infrastructure” (relatively new notion in the national legislation), “unlawful intrusion”, “computer crimes”, “critical information infrastructure” and other concepts important to the nuclear industry were considered in this research. The notions presented in different regulatory documents were analyzed.
 The paper emphasizes that the legislation of Ukraine does not currently present special (separate) standards on the criminal liability for offences against critical infrastructure objects. Some promising issues related to fundamentals of the criminal liability and protection of critical infrastructure objects in the nuclear industry were also considered.
 The research involves the prospect of further development of a special law to define the area for improving relevant legislation on general regulation of these issues.
 The paper also stresses on the need to introduce some changes to the Criminal Code of Ukraine with respect to certain articles of section XIV.