Military law in 2025 began to fulfill its key function of limiting state by law in wartime - opinion

In 2025, military law began to fulfill its key function of limiting the state by law in wartime, believes Kateryna Anyshchenko, a lawyer at the Riyako&Partners law firm.

"2025 was a turning point for the military law of Ukraine. As a lawyer who systematically works with military cases, I can say: we have finally gone beyond the notion that military law is the law of exceptions. On the contrary, it was in 2025 that it began to fulfill its key function - to limit the state by law even in wartime," she told Interfax-Ukraine, commenting on the trends in the development of military law in Ukraine.

Anyshchenko noted that as a lawyer in her practice in 2025, she increasingly encountered situations where martial law was used not as a legal regime, but as an "argument for absolving responsibility."

"Formal conclusions of the Military Commission, template decisions of the Central Military Commission, silent inaction of military administrations - all this became a mass phenomenon precisely in 2025. However, this same year demonstrated something else: the courts stopped accepting "war" as a universal explanation for violations. Procedure, motivation, evidence again became decisive, and this is a fundamental change," she said.

The lawyer noted that last year military law ceased to be an instrument of pressure and is gradually turning into a mechanism of protection for both the serviceman and the state.

"In 2025, it was the court that became the main regulator of military law. Not the legislator and not the executive branch, but judicial practice forced state bodies to act in the legal field. In my cases, I have repeatedly observed how the court recognizes the inaction of the Central Military Commission and the Joint Forces as illegal or forms a standard of proof that cannot be circumvented by formal certificates. This means one thing: military law has ceased to be 'outside the court'," she said.

Anyshchenko noted that "the majority of appeals in 2025 concerned the passage of the military medical commission (VLK), appealing conclusions, referrals for additional examinations, compliance with medical documents and (most often) a conflict between the actual state of health and the formal procedure." In addition, the lawyer noted that last year the issues of booking and postponement were relevant for business. "For critical enterprises and employers, the key factors were the predictability of decisions, timeliness and confirmation of booking, the correctness of data in the registers, as well as communication with the military recruitment centers without the 'human factor' and double interpretations," she explained.

Analyzing the trends of the year in this direction, the expert separately emphasized the relevance in the field of military law of the issues of social guarantees of military personnel and their families and liability for military offenses.

Among the main problems of this area in 2025, the lawyer named the unevenness of practice in different regions, in particular, different procedural 'routes' and results in the same situations, as well as violations of the procedure as a source of conflicts and criminalization of everyday situations, low quality of primary documentation, vulnerability of families in issues of payments and statuses, and lack of preventive legal culture.

"The largest number of 'acute' cases arise where people react emotionally instead of the legal algorithm. This applies to conflicts with representatives of the military recruitment centers, and appeals to the VLK and recording of violations," she said.

Predicting the development of the field of military law in 2026, Anishchenko expects, in particular, more disputes about the quality of the military medical commissions and increased requirements for the transparency of decisions, because the courts began to adjust their approach to medical examinations in 2025.

In addition, Anishchenko expects that in the direction of booking, the focus will shift to criticality and evidence.

"We are already preparing for a wave of cases related to demobilization, veteran status, rehabilitation and compensation. Military law is gradually moving from war management to managing its consequences. In my opinion, 2026 will be the year of systematization of practice and strengthening of digital control, which will simultaneously create new opportunities and new risks for citizens and businesses," she said.

"In 2026, we will see not a weakening, but a maturation of military law. The conclusion based on the results of 2025 is simple: military law can no longer exist without a lawyer and without a court," the lawyer emphasized.

For her part, the managing director of Polina Marchenko Law Office, attorney Polina Marchenko, predicts that "for military personnel, 2026 will be marked by limited, clearly regulated rotations without mass demobilization." She also expects the grounds for discharge from service to be revised and narrowed, especially on family and medical grounds, and the legal protection of military personnel in disputes with the state, in her opinion, will remain "formal, with low chances of satisfying the requirements."

Moreover, the lawyer predicts that for military personnel, the number of real grounds for deferment will be significantly reduced, and their application will become more formalized and controlled.