COMMERCIAL COURTS Judges of commercial courts verified the identity of the participants of the trial who arrived to the hearing in 96% of cases. The confidentiality of a deliberations room was observed in 91% of cases. This is the lowest rate compared to other courts. From the questionnaire of a monitor on a commercial court of appeal: “In the course of the trial the court asked the parties to leave the courtroom as the judges needed to confer (before leaving for the deliberations room)”. PUBLICITY The courts published information about the hearings schedule on their web-sites in 94% of cases. Nevertheless, this information was not always complete and correct. Schedules were published on the courts' information boards somewhat less frequently – in 79% of cases. This is also the lowest rating compared to other courts. In 98% of cases the monitors were able to get inside the room where the case was being heard (courtrooms or judges’ chambers). In 80% of cases the court considered the case in the court hearing room. Only in one third of cases (31%) the judges of commercial courts did show interest in who was present at the trial in addition to the parties to the case. This indicator is worse than in other courts. This might be due to the fact that the judges of commercial courts are not used to the presence of other persons, except the parties to the case, in the hearings. Commercial cases seldom become high-profile and of interest to the public compared to other case types. From the questionnaires of monitors about commercial courts (of different levels and regions): “The presiding judge asked who I was and which party I represented (and asked the parties if they knew me), asked me to show my ID, put down my name in her notebook and looked at each page of my passport. After that, she allowed me to be present at the hearing after informing me of my rights as follows, “You have the right to be present at the hearings, but make no records and do not obstruct the hearing in any way!”. After that, she made sure I understood what she had said”. “The secretary of the court hearing took the monitor’s passport to “input data into the voice recording system”. The document was returned to the monitor during the hearing”. “The secretary of the court hearing allowed the monitor to the hearing on condition that she would make a photocopy of his passport”, “the court established the identity of the monitor on the grounds of his passport and made its copy”. “Before the beginning of the hearing the secretary, after finding out that there will be an independent attendee in the case, noted that he was supposed to file a motion to request participation in the hearing”. “In the course of the hearing the judge asked who I was and why I came to the hearing, she noted that I was supposed to inform her thereof. Before leaving for the deliberations room she asked me what I thought about the case”. Report on the findings of the first trial monitoring programme in Ukraine 27