Federation of Trade Unions of Ukraine

The Federation of Trade Unions of Ukraine (known by its Ukrainian acronym, FPU) is the largest trade union centre in Ukraine, with more than 4.8 million members. As of 1 August 2019, 44 national trade unions and 27 regional trade unions were affiliated to the FPU.

It is headquartered in the historic Trade Unions Building in Kyiv.

Organisation and activities The aim of the FPU is to express and represent the interests and protect the rights of its member organisations, coordinate their collective actions, promote unity in the trade union movement, represent and protect labour and the socio-economic rights and interests of trade union members before state and local authorities, represent the interests of members in their relationship with employers and their organisations and represent its members in interactions with other citizens’ associations.

The FPU main tasks are protection of labour, socio-economic rights and interests of trade union members; social protection of trade union members and their families; legal protection of trade union members; strengthening of FPU influence on political life and in the formation of the civil society; improvement of the social contract with other trade unions, employers and the state; cooperating with other trade unions and their associations; building and maintaining the equality of rights and opportunities for men and women; strengthening the FPU as a democratic trade union and strengthening and widening FPU international relations.

At the international level, the FPU is affiliated with the International Trade Union Confederation and Pan-European Regional Council.

The FPU is participating in the United Nations Global Compact and has a consultative status with the UN ECOSOC.

History The Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Ukraine was established after Ukraine became independent on 6 October 1990. It was a successor to the Ukrainian Republican Council of Trade Unions, which was part of the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions. The declaration creating the FPU was signed by 25 national and 24 regional trade unions.

In November 1992, at its Second (Extraordinary) Congress, the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Ukraine was renamed the Federation of Trade Unions of Ukraine.

In June and July 2011, the Prosecutor General of Ukraine opened 35 criminal cases against the FPU for alleged misappropriation of sanatoriums. In November, Vasyl Khara, the president of FPU resignedUkrainian Trade Union Federation head Khara resigns, Kyiv Post (7 November 2011)

In 2013 and 2014, during the Euromaidan protests, the union's office in Kyiv, the Trade Unions Building, served as the headquarters for the protesters. As a consequence of the fighting, the building burned to the ground.

In June 2014, a group of people wearing army fatigues bearing the insignia of Right Sector and Social-National Assembly stormed the FPU Council in Kyiv in an attempt to disrupt the election of a new leadership. It was unclear whether they had any relation to the Right Sector and Social-National Assembly group themselves.

In 2020, after the election of Volodymyr Zelenskyy the government doubled down on earlier legal processes to acquire property owned by the FPU. The same year, the Ukrainian State Bureau of Investigation alleged that union officials had sold 80 properties illegally by not consulting with the government before selling.

In 2022, the government passed controversial labour laws that invalidated collective agreements during martial law, legalised zero-hour contracts, increased the maximum legal work day to 12 hours, and allowed employers to fire workers without justification. As a response, the FPU presented a challenge in the Constitutional Court and with the International Labour Organization.

In October 2022, the FPU was granted affiliate status to the European Trade Union Confederation.

In April 2025, the union's president Grygorii Osovyi was put under house arrest along with the leader of the KVPU, amid government moves to seize property owned by the FPU, an action sparking response from the international labour movement. The reasoning for the arrest being misappropriation of property the government sees as their own.

On April 22, the headquarters of the FPU were seized and transferred to a private trust by the Asset Recovery and Management Agency.

Affiliates Union Membership (2018) Agricultural Industry Workers' Union 400,000 Aircraft Builders' Union of Ukraine 55,000 All-Ukrainian Independent Transport Workers' Union 19,700 All-Ukrainian Lawyers' Union of Ukraine 1,400 All-Ukrainian Union 'Football of Ukraine' 1,200 All-Ukrainian Union of Producers and Entrepreneurs 3,100 All-Ukrainian Union of Workers and Entrepreneurs in Trade, Catering and Services 40,800 Automobile and Agricultural Machine Building Workers' Union of Ukraine 36,500 Aviation Workers' Union of Ukraine 18,500 Chemical and Petrochemical Industries Workers' Union of Ukraine 59,900 Coal Industry Workers' Union of Ukraine 74,600 Communications Workers' Union of Ukraine 78,800 Construction and Building Materials Industry Workers' Union of Ukraine 60,300 Consumer Cooperatives Workers' Union of Ukraine 28,300 Culture Workers' Union of Ukraine 148,900 Defence Industry Workers' Union of Ukraine 20,900 Energy and Electrical Industry Workers' Union of Ukraine 122,500 Fishing Industry Workers' Union of Ukraine 18,200 Forest Industries Workers' Union of Ukraine 10,900 Forestry Workers' Union of Ukraine 68,700 Gas Facilities Workers' Union of Ukraine 45,900 Geology, Geodesy and Cartography Workers' Union of Ukraine 10,200 Health Workers' Union of Ukraine 747,600 Housing, Utility, and Domestic Services and Local Industry Workers' Union 197,200 Innovative and Small Enterprises Workers' Union of Ukraine 4,000 Machine Builders and Instrument Makers' Union of Ukraine 10,000 Machine Builders and Metalworkers' Union of Ukraine 75,900 Nuclear Energy and Industry Workers' Union of Ukraine 60,500 Oil and Gas Industry Workers' Union 94,600 Pension Fund Workers' Union of Ukraine 21,000 Radio-electronics and Engineering Workers' Union of Ukraine 18,900 Road Transport and Road Economy Workers' Union of Ukraine 42,200 Sea Transport Workers' Union of Ukraine 30,600 Shipbuilding Workers' Union of Ukraine 20,800 Social Workers' Union of Ukraine 61,200 Space and General Engineering Workers' Union of Ukraine 24,800 State Employees' Union of Ukraine 208,100 Taxi Drivers' Union of Ukraine 8,600 Textile and Light Industry Workers' Union of Ukraine 12,700 Trade Union of Education and Science Workers of Ukraine 1,530,000 Trade Union of Workers of Metallurgical and Mining Industries of Ukraine 289,200 Ukrainian Federation of Trade Union Organisations - Foreign Investments Enterprises, Partnerships, Organisations and Institutions Workers' Union of Ukraine 3,800 Ukrainian River Transport Workers' Union 10,000 Youth Housing Complexes and Local Government Committees Workers' Union of Ukraine 1,000

Chairs 1992: Stoyan Alexander Nikolaevich 2005: Yurkin Alexander Valentinovich 2008: Vasyl Khara 2011: Yuriy Kulyk 2014: Grygorii Osovyi

Federation of Trade Unions of Ukraine

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