Officially: there are more than 70 thousand advocates in Ukraine

Recently, the number of advocates in our country has exceeded 70 thousand. To be more precise, as of today, the Unified Register of Advocates of Ukraine contains information about 70152 attorneys.

The official statistics were provided by Valentyn Gvozdiy, the Vice President of the Ukrainian National Bar Association and the Bar Council of Ukraine, during a meeting of the Bar Council held today, December 13, in Lviv Oblast.

He said that this year alone, the defense bar has been joined by 2,280 new colleagues. However, there are 47.4 thousand active attorneys (those who practice and have not filed an application to suspend their practice), which is 67.6% of the total number. The URAU also registers 1026 trainees and 3.5 thousand paralegals. And the vast majority (94.7%) of active attorneys use the UNBA's electronic office, which provides access to UNBA services.

In addition, the Vice President of the UNBA, BCU, the UNBA said that in 2024 the level of payment of annual contributions to ensure the implementation of bar self-government increased. Financial discipline is observed by 82% of colleagues. «I believe that this is a very high percentage. And this is the best indicator for any previous years, for which we should thank, first of all, the heads of regional councils», - he explained.

He also said that the Council of Europe is preparing to vote on the draft Convention on the Protection of the Legal Profession, which will be the first document in the world to establish international standards for the protection of lawyers and the independence of the institution. «This convention will be binding on the signatory countries. And Ukraine, which has become one of the authors, should be one of the first», - the Vice President of the UNBA, BCU is convinced.

It should be reminded that the Committee of Experts on the Protection of Lawyers (CJ-AV), whose vice president was V. Gvozdiy, was engaged in the development of the concept and drafting of the Convention. The CJ-AV operated under the Committee of Ministers and the European Committee on Legal Cooperation (CDCJ) of the Council of Europe.