For Families of the Deceased

Contents

Notification of death

Notification of death is provided by the Ukrainian side to the diplomatic representation of the state of origin of the personnel.

The duty to inform the family rests with the authorities of the state from which the personnel comes.

In practice, different states have different approaches to this process: in Germany, notification is performed by the police; in France – by a special crisis centre; in Colombia – directly by diplomats.

It should be noted that Colombia does not have diplomatic representation in Ukraine; therefore, all notifications are sent through the Embassy of Colombia in Poland. Sometimes, this may cause problems, such as delays in responses from the diplomatic mission or refusals to assist. In such cases, the contact details of families, collected by military units at the time of signing the contract, may be useful. Therefore, sometimes the units themselves provide initial notification of the family, although this is prohibited under governing documents. In addition, units hand over the personnel's belongings to the family.

Transfer of the Body to the Family

• If the family agrees to burial in Ukraine, a farewell ceremony and burial of the foreign military personnel or their ashes is conducted with military honours, as provided for all military personnel of the Defence Forces of Ukraine.

• If the family chooses the repatriation process (transfer of the body abroad), the unit organises a farewell ceremony in Ukraine, after which the coffin with the body or the urn with the ashes is transferred abroad with the assistance of funeral companies.

The services of the funeral company are paid for by the unit.

One-Off Financial Allowance

The amount is UAH 15,000,000, distributed equally among all beneficiaries.

Eligible persons:

• children, including adopted children, those conceived during the lifetime of the deceased military personnel and born after their death, as well as children over whom the deceased had previously lost parental rights,

• widow,

• parents, if they were not deprived of parental rights in relation to the deceased,

• grandchildren, if their parents had died by the time of the personnel death,

• a partner with whom the deceased military personnel lived as one family without being married to each other or to anyone else, provided this fact is established by a court decision that has entered into legal force.

One-off financial allowance is not paid to:

• citizens of the Russian Federation or the Republic of Belarus,

• persons permanently residing in the territories of these countries,

• persons convicted of treason, collaboration, or aiding the aggressor state.

Documents Required to Receive One-Off Financial Allowance

• a copy of the national passport and a copy of the certificate in case of a change of name/surname,

• a copy of a document confirming the registered place of residence,

• a copy of a document confirming family ties (marriage certificate, birth certificate of children, birth certificate of the missing personnel – for parents),

• in case of the death of a family member, a copy of the death certificate,

• in case the military personnel were unmarried and/or had no children, a copy of a document confirming these statuses,

• in case a family member wishes to transfer their share to another, a notarised power of attorney for such an act,

• a copy of the tax ID.

After this, the family has two options:

• a family representative with powers of attorney from other family members travels to Ukraine personally, where a notarised translation of the entire package of documents into Ukrainian is prepared, an application for payment is submitted, and a bank account is opened in a Ukrainian bank;

• family representatives send a package of documents, along with a power of attorney, to a relative/lawyer/other family representative in Ukraine, who then carries out the same procedure.