Insufficient salaries for employees in the health service have led to emigration of qualified staff. It has also affected professional competency and fed corruption practices, thus leading to inequalities in access to health care. 41. More generally, the socio-economic situation in Ukraine is of concern and constitutes one of the causes of recent events. In its 2008 review of the implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in Ukraine, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights expressed a number of concerns. In particular, it referred to a finding that 28 per cent of the population reportedly lived below the official poverty line, that the minimum wage does not provide an adequate standard of living, and that unemployment benefits amount to 50 per cent of the minimum subsistence level. It also expressed concern at the inadequate level of social assistance, and that several hundreds of thousands of children below the age of 15 were working in the informal and illegal economy and several thousands of children living in the street. 42. These concerns should constitute priorities for any new Government in Ukraine in the coming months and years. The Ukrainian Authorities must, as a matter of priority, put in place measures to eradicate corruption, while ensuring good governance and the rule of law. In addition, efforts should be made to redress disparities in standards of living and ensure equal access to, and quality of, health, education, employment and social support structures for all, including marginalised communities throughout the country. B. Lack of accountability for human rights violations and rule of law institutions 43. The justice system in Ukraine has traditionally been marred by systemic deficiencies, including corruption, lack of independence and a lack of equality of arms between prosecution and defence in criminal proceedings. Other major concerns relate to the excessive use and length of pre-trial detention, numerous reports of cases of torture and ill-treatment, a significant reliance on suspects’ confessions during criminal proceedings, insufficient or inadequate legal reasoning in indictments and overall underfunding of the justice system. 44. A new Code of Criminal Procedure (CCP) entered into force in November 2012. The new code responds to some of the major concerns expressed by UN human rights mechanisms (e.g. the UN Human Rights Council, Universal Periodic Review, or the UN Human Rights Committee). It introduces an adversarial system; supports the presumption of innocence, including the need to specify the circumstances suggesting reasonable suspicion that would justify a deprivation of liberty; and provides increased safeguards for timely access of detainees to a lawyer and a doctor. Alternative measures to deprivation of liberty are also provided. 45. A round-table discussion organized in November 2013 by the Ombudsperson’s office on the occasion of the first anniversary of the entry into force of the new CCP identified the substantial decrease in the number of pre-trial detentions as a clear achievement since the entry into force of the new code. However, dozens of people who participated in the Maidan demonstrations were arrested and held in police custody and lengthy pre-trial detention, subjected to torture and ill-treatment, and deprived of their right to a fair trial and due process, in violations of the new CCP. 46. Other challenges remain. The provisions of the new CCP are not applied to all cases. Those opened before November 2012 are still processed under the former Code. The lack of 11 | P a g e