The Ukrainian Weekly 2011-21

8/6/2019 The Ukrainian Weekly 2011-21

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Published by the Ukrainian National Association Inc., a fraternal non-profit association

$1/$2 in UkraineVol. LXXIX No. 21 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, MAY 22, 2011TheUkrainianWeekly

InsIde:

Analysis: The Victory Day spectacle and beyond page 3. Investors sue producers of Holodomor film page 4. Commentary: The Obama reset and Ukraine page 6.

by Anna Mostovych

CHICAGO Twenty five years afterthe Chornobyl catastrophe and twomonths af ter the accident at theFukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant inJapan, several organizations in Chicago

joined forces to commemorate one disas-ter and bring attention to the other.

The multifaceted event featuring akeynote address by Dr. Yuri Shcherbak,the presentation of awards to Chornobyl

researchers, a photography exhibit and adocumentary film was held at theChicago Cultural Center on Thursdayevening, April 28.

Some 350 people, representingChicagos diplomatic corps, theConsulates of Japan and Ukraine, andmembers of the Ukrainian American andgreater Chicago communities, attended.

Vera Eliashevsky, chair of the KyivCommittee of Chicago Sister CitiesInternational, which spearheaded theevent, set the evenings tone in her intro-ductory remarks. We honor those whoperished and those who survived, shesaid, requesting prayers for victims ofboth the Chornobyl and Fukushima disas-ters. The Rev. Myron Panchuk, co-chairof the anniversary planning committee,then asked for a moment of silence for allthe victims.

Co-chair Dr. Daniel Hryhorchuk, direc-tor of global environmental health at UICCollege of Medicine, extended empathyand solidarity to the people of Japan andread official greetings from various digni-taries, including Chicago Mayor RichardM. Daley, Ambassador Oleksandr Motsykof Ukraine and Dr. Boris Lushniak, depu-ty surgeon general of the United States.

Chicago community commemorates Chornobyl anniversary

(Continued on page 8)

by Volodymyr Musyak

Special to The Ukrainian Weekly

KYIV The life of imprisoned formerInternal Affairs Minister Yurii Lutsenko,who has been on a hunger strike sinceApril 22, is reportedly in danger as heawaits a corruption trial that is widelyviewed as part of the Ukrainian govern-ments political persecution of the oppo-

sition.

His wife, Iryna, whos been allowed tovisit him only periodically, reported onMay 19 that her husband has an inflamedesophagus, 20 intestinal ulcers and deterio-rating blood vessels in the brain. Doctorshad previously said starvation caused achronically inflamed pancreas and Type 2diabetes. Prominent leaders called uponMr. Lutsenko to stop starving himselfbefore he does permanent harm to himself.

by Zenon Zawada

Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV Historical phenomena suchas the Holodomor the Famine-Genocide of 1932-1933 in Ukraine have come under increasing attack fromStalin apologists creeping into the main-stream of Russian and Ukrainian societ-ies.

With Kremlin support, the debate hasdegenerated questions about whatcaused the Holodomor to whether it wasgenocide at all and whether it wasunique to Ukraine.

For example, Russian historians haveincreasingly argued that famines in theLower Volga basin and Kazakhstan dur-ing the same period also qualify as geno-cide, making the Holodomor not uniqueto Ukraine.

To combat such historical revisionism,Dr. Norman M. Naimarks book StalinsGenocides (Princeton University Press,2010) has been translated into Ukrainianand published by the National Universityof Kyiv Mohyla Academy.

Dr. Naimarks work arrives at a timewhen neo-Soviet cultural policies arebeing pursued by the administration ofViktor Yanukovych and his minister ofeducation, science, youth and sports,Dmytro Tabachnyk. These policies rejectnotions of Russification and Soviet sub-

jugatio n of the Ukraini an nat ion, andcast the Soviet experience in a largelypositive light.

Their political force, the Party ofRegions of Ukraine, rejects the idea thatthe Holodomor was a genocide orches-

trated by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin

Hunger-striking Lutsenkoreported to be seriously ill

Translation of U.S. scholars bookaims to fight historical revisionism


and his entourage to eliminate theUkrainian peasant class which was notonly opposed to collectivization but was

also the core of Ukrainian national iden-tity as the biggest threat to Soviet rule.

They say the Holodomor was part of atragedy endured by the people of theUSSR equally, without any particularnation being singled out. They argue thatnon-Ukrainians also died in theHolodomor.

The Communist Party of Ukrainegoes so far as to allege that there was noartificially induced famine, but merelyharvest troubles in separate regions ofUkraine. The Holodomor concept wasinvented at Harvard University as anti-Soviet propaganda, the party alleges inits literature.

I came to the conclusion, and Iproved that Stalin persecuted the

Ukrainian peasants in order to disallowachieving independence, to deprive themof their nationality, and to deprive themof creating opposition to Sovietization insome way, Dr. Naimark told a May 10press conference in Kyiv.

The combination of these social andethno-national dimensions was at thecore of Stalins destructive, ruinouscampaign, said the Stanford Universityscholar.

Dr. Naimarks book was translated byVasyl Starko in record time, said Dr.Serhiy Kvit, rector of the NationalUniversity of Kyiv Mohyla Academy.

In the book Dr. Naimark offers evi-dence that Stalins genocides persistedduring the period between the early


Core lessons of Chornobyl

For Dr. Shcherbak, former ambassadorof Ukraine to Israel, Canada and theUnited States, the two disasters wereglobal-scale events that affected the des-tinies of millions of people and demon-strated that any nuclear reactor of anytype and any design in any country is adelayed atom bomb that requires han-dling with utmost responsibility.

In his keynote address, Chornobyl:

25 Years After: Lessons for Mankind,Dr. Shcherbak, who flew in from Kyivespecially for the commemoration, drewon his experience as an eyewitness to theChornobyl disaster and as Ukraines firstminister of environmental protection, aswell as on his expertise as a medical doc-tor and epidemiologist.

Dr. Yuri Shcherbak delivers the key-note address at the Chicago commemo-ration of the 25th anniversary of the

Chornobyl nuclear disaster.

Walter Tun

Yurii Lutsenko, former internal affairs minister of Ukraine, in an April 21 phototaken in the Kyiv appellate court, which ruled that day to keep him behind bars.Mr. Lutsenko declared a hunger strike the next day to protest his imprisonment.

UNIAN/Aleksandr Kosarev


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No. 21THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, MAY 22, 20112

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Rada wont condemn Putins remarks

KYIV The Verkhovna Rada hasrefused to condemn the statement byRussian Prime Minister Vladimir Putindiminishing the role of Ukraine in the vic-tory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945, it was reported on May 18. Thedraft response of the Ukrainian Parliamentto Mr. Putin, filed by the opposition fac-tion Our UkrainePeoples Self-Defense,received only 97 votes. The rejected draftstatement also proposed calling on theRussian government to treat with respectthe tragic pages of Ukraines history andto prevent speculation on sensitive topics.Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin onDecember 16, 2010, said that the USSRwould have won the war even withoutUkraine. The Foreign Affairs Ministry ofUkraine did not give an official responseto the statement, describing it as the per-sonal position of the Russian prime minis-ter. (Ukrinform)

Yanukovych on ethno-national policy

KYIV Ukrainian President ViktorYanukovych has said that the principles ofstate ethno-national policy and tolerancehave to be improved. Much work is stillto be done. We should improve the princi-ples of the state ethno-national policy,establish an intercultural dialogue and tol-erance in public life, and work more onthe settlement of problems linked to theimprovement of life in the motherland ofthose deported and their descendants,reads the text of presidents address on theoccasion of the 67th anniversary of depor-tation of Crimean Tatars and persons ofother nationalities from Crimea. PresidentYanukovych noted that 67 years ago about200,000 Crimean Tatars were deportedfrom the Crimean peninsula, whichdestroyed their centuries-old life organi-zation and cultural tradition. The presi-dent said, The obtaining of independenceby Ukraine opened the way back to theirnative land for those deported, and at pres-ent we can be proud of the variety of ourmultinational cultural heritage. We byright are proud that over the years ofUkraines independence there were noserious international conflicts. This testi-

fies that we are a united people, the soli-darity of which nobody and nothing candestroy. (Interfax Ukraine)

Investors sour on Ukraine

LONDON Reform has ground to a

halt in Ukraine, which is losing its invest-ment appeal, investors said during the sev-enth Adam Smith Conference summit inLondon. The situation in Ukraine is disap-pointing, said Timothy Ash, director foremerging market research at Royal Bankof Scotland, according to May 16 newsreports. Prospects were good a year agoand it seemed that remarkable people inthe administration would not only talk, butalso promote reform, he said. Everythinglooked promising until November 2010,when the process of reforms halted, saidAnders Aslund, senior researcher at thePeterson Institute for InternationalEconomics. Mr. Ash also said that half ofthe growth in investment in Ukraine wasdue to banks, especially banks with for-

eign capital. But after the crisis and due toa low level of capital return banks willremain cautious for a long time, he said.The only exceptions are Russian banks,which have been aggressively expandingtheir balances, driven by geopoliticalinterests, the RBS representative said.Investors have been increasingly eyeingAsia, Latin America and Africa, thereforerivalry for investment has been increasingin Europe, he said. Neighboring countrieshave managed to create a far more appeal-ing investment climate than Ukraine, Mr.Ash said. (Interfax-Ukraine)

A shameful Victory Day

KYIV National Deputy AndriyShevchenko of the Yulia Tymoshenko

Bloc-Batkivschyna faction said he thinksthe people of Ukraine deserve an apologyfor the May 9 clashes in Lviv. This situa-tion deserves an honest conversation andapologies, and people will draw their ownconclusions, he said in Parliament onMay 11. He said that this years VictoryDay on May 9 made it possible to drawcertain conclusions: Conclusion No. 1:We had the most shameful Victory Day in

ANALYSIS


by Pavel Korduban

Eurasia Daily Monitor

Clashes between far-right and pro-Russian activists married the Victory Dayceremonies in the western Ukrainian cityof Lviv on May 9.

Militants from the far-right Svobodaparty beat up pro-Russian activists, whoarrived in Lviv from Russophone south-ern regions, clashed with police, burnedred flags and destroyed a wreath whichthe Russian consul, Oleg Astakhov, wasgoing to lay at the local cemetery. Onemember of Svoboda was shot in the legby a local pro-Russian activist (www.zaxid.net, Ukrayinska Pravda, May 9).Lviv Oblast Governor MykhailoTsymbaliuk, pressed by the Svobodaparty, which dominates the regionalcouncil, tendered his resignation on the

following day (www.zaxid.net, May 10).The radicals from the Svoboda party in

Lviv made use of divide-and-rule tactics,which the ruling Party of Regions (PRU)pursues ahead of the parliamentary elec-tions scheduled for October 2012. OnApril 21, the PRU-dominated Parliamentruled that red flags would be used alongwith the national blue-and-yellow flagsduring the Victory Day celebrations acrossthe country. By doing so, the PRU deliber-ately provoked tension in Lviv and otherwestern areas where red flags are associat-ed with communism and the Soviet occu-pation in the mid-20th century rather thanwith the victory in World War II.

On April 28, the Lviv Oblast Councilruled to outlaw red flags in Lviv (www.

zaxid.net, April 28). At the same time,pro-Russian activists from Crimea decid-ed to go to Lviv with red flags evidentlyto provoke the Svoboda party and othernationalists (www.comments.ua, May 6).Conflict in this context was inevitable.

Despite ideological differences,Svoboda and the PRU pursue one com-mon goal ahead of the parliamentaryelection. This is to weaken the most pop-ular opposition force, the bloc of formerPrime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko. PRUideologists want to radicalize society inwestern Ukraine where Svoboda and theYulia Tymoshenko Bloc (YTB) share thesame nationalist electorate so that themore radical elements of the electoratevote for Svoboda rather than the YTB.

Such tactics worked in the local elec-tions last fall, as a result of whichSvoboda dominates several oblast coun-cils in western Ukraine. At the same time,support for Svoboda is limited to that partof Ukraine, while popular support forYTB is geographically much wider, soSvoboda is seen in the PRU as a lesser

evil on the national scale.Opinion polls conducted this year and

in 2010 show that Svobodas popularityhas been on the rise, but it is far fromsupplanting the YTB as the most popularopposition party. It is currently only thethird most popular opposition force.According to opinion polls by the Kyiv-based Razumkov think-tank, the share ofUkrainians who are ready to vote forSvoboda increased from 2.8 percent inAugust 2010 to 4.6 percent in April 2011.Over the same period, support for theYTB grew from 13.7 percent to 17.9 per-cent. The figures for the second mostpopular opposition party, the Front forChange, which is headed by charismaticand young former chairman of theVerkhovna Rada Arseniy Yatsenyuk,improved from 5.3 percent to 10.8 per-cent.

The oppositions popularity is growingobviously at the expense of the PRU andits junior partner in the government, therelatively new party Strong Ukraine,whose leader is the liberal Vice PrimeMinister Sergey Tigipko. Razumkovspolling figures for the two partiesplunged, respectively, from 41.2 percentto 22.1 percent and from 11.1 percent to6.1 percent.

Mr. Tigipko has signaled that he mayquit the government to focus on the elec-tion campaign if the government contin-ues to drag its feet over unpopular marketreforms (Ukrayinska Pravda, March 18;Inter TV, March 25). As a result, StrongUkraines popularity may grow at theexpense of both the YTB and the PRU as

last years presidential election showedMr. Tigipko drew support from theregional strongholds of both parties.

Mr. Tigipko may well join the ranks ofthe opposition ahead of the election, fur-ther fragmenting the opposition, which isdisunited even without him.

Ms. Tymoshenko is wary of allianceswith smaller nationalist opposition partiessuch as former President ViktorYushchenkos Our Ukraine after hersquabbles with them when she was primeminister in 2008-2010. She told a recentpress conference that she does not talkwith Mr. Yushchenko as they share differ-ent values (UNIAN, May 6).

The ambitious Mr. Yatsenyuk does notintend to join any alliances either. He saidhis goal is to overtake the YTB in the2012 polls so as to become the secondstrongest party in parliament after thePRU (Segodnya, February 21).

The Svoboda party is not against form-ing alliances, its leader, Oleh Tiahnybok

Opposition remains fragmentedahead of 2012 parliamentary election

KYIV A Ukrainian weather forecast-er, Lyudmila Savchenko, who is well-known on national radio for her dailyweather reports, has created a storm ofher own by taking a swipe at Ukrainesleadership during a live radio broadcast,

Reuters reported on May 18.According to the news service, Ms.

Savchenko, head of the forecasting sec-tion of Ukraines meteorological service,said: One cannot remain indifferent tothis beauty which shows in the tenderscent of lilac and lily of the valley, andthe melodious trilling of the birds.

At times it seems that such miracu-lous days are a gift from nature to com-

pensate us for the chaos, lawlessness andinjustice that reign in our country, sheadded. It is simply incomprehensiblethat anyone can dislike this paradise onearth, this country, the Ukrainian peopleso much that they treat it so badly.

Ukrayinska Pravda cited a source atnational radio in reporting that after Ms.Savchenkos remarks a decision was madeto end live broadcasts from the weather cen-ter. It was unclear whether any action wouldbe taken against the weather forecaster.However, Verkhovna Rada ChairmanVolodymyr Lytvyn said Parliament wouldsupport an opposition move to ask nationalradio not to sack Ms. Savchenko.

Weather forecast plus political commentary



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3THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, MAY 22, 2011No.21

Quotable notesMyth No. 1 is that the red flag is a symbol of victory. On the contrary, under

this flag, the Soviets started a bloody war on September 1, 1939. This fact is hid-den by those who want to enforce upon Ukrainians Stalins interpretation of

World War II history.Many Ukrainians do not really know who started the war. They were Joseph

Stalin and Adolph Hitler.

Taras Vozniak, political expert and editor of the independent magazine Yi, ina May 5 interview with ZIK (Western Information Agency), answering the ques-tion: What myths about World War II dominate history books and the mindsetsof Ukrainians?

I will say it frankly: for the past few years I have not felt the trauma that Iexperienced on May 9. What kind of a nation would mark this day by standingunder the red banner?

Former President Viktor Yushchenko, speaking during events commemorat-ing victims of Communist repressions at the Bykivnia Graves National Reserveon May 15, as quoted by Interfax-Ukraine.

Ukraine is the most divided today than at any time in its two-decade history,

something deepened by [Minister of Science, Education, Youth and SportsDmytro] Tabachnyk and the flying of the Soviet flag in World War II victory cel-ebrations this month. Ukraines divisions were pushed by the Yanukovych elec-tion campaign to the brink of civil war in the 2004 elections and have been madeworse by his successive policies.

Taras Kuzio, an Austrian Marshall Plan Foundation visiting fellow at theCenter for Transatlantic Relations, School of Advanced International Studies,John Hopkins University, in his commentary Time to Take a Reality Check,published in the Kyiv Post on May 11.

NEWS ANALYSIS: The V-Day spectacle and beyondby Mykola Riabchuk

Show, spectacle, theater and per-formance seem to be the most popularmetaphors employed by Ukrainian observ-ers to describe the May 9 clashes in Lvivbetween local nationalists and Russianbarnstormers who came with red flags from

Odesa and Crimea to celebrate Victory Dayin a city that has a substantially differentview of the victory and a radically differ-ent view of red flags.

The theatrical metaphors should notundermine the seriousness of the conflictand its consequences for Ukraines future.Rather, they signal the staged, prefabricatedcharacter of the event, pointing to its Kyivdirectors and, arguably, Moscow architects.

The stage for the conflict was set onApril 21 when the Ukrainian Parliamentamended the 2000 law on commemorationof victory in the so-called Great PatrioticWar of 1941-1945. A politically crucialrequest was added to raise the red Sovietflag (euphemistically defined as the Flagof Victory) on all official buildings andsites, and to use it at all official ceremonieson V-Day and at relevant events, alongsidethe national blue-and-yellow flag.

Neither Ukrainian national deputiesnor the president needed to have beengreat statesmen to understand the provoc-ative and subversive character of thissuggestion. Even if they watched onlyRussian TV and used no other sources ofinformation, they would certainly haveknown that the Soviet flag is absolutelyunacceptable for a significant portion ofthe Ukrainian population, primarily in thewestern but also in the central part of thecountry. They should certainly haveknown that for millions of Ukrainians thered flag is, first and foremost, the symbolof occupation, of terror and genocide, thegulag and the Holodomor, Russification,

and national humiliation.For many Ukrainians, like for the Poles

and the Balts, World War II on their territo-ry was a clash of two equally dreadful pred-ators: the Nazis and Bolsheviks. Which ofthe two was more oppressive might be aninteresting question for academic debates,but it is of little relevance for people whofeel today that the Nazi regime is dead andburied, while the Soviet regime, in itsPutinist neo-imperial reincarnation, is aliveand well, and still threatens their shaky sta-bility and sovereignty by various means.

This is why a significant portion ofUkrainians does not buy the Stalinistnotion of the Great Patriotic War andrejects defiantly Russian attempts to capi-talize politically on the historical victory

by promoting particular nationalistic andimperialistic agenda.So, the main question is whether

President Viktor Yanukovych and hisParty of Regions (in fact, the party of oneregion, mostly comprising the Donbas)share the Russian nationalistic view ofthe second world war as a great victory ofthe Soviet (read Russian) people and theproof of their superiority over theirneighbors, thus legitimizing their currentprivileged interests in the region.

This might well be true taking intoaccount the provincial character of the rul-ing Donbas elite, their extremely low cul-tural and educational level, poor knowledgeof both national and global history and theoutside world in general, the profoundentrenchment of Soviet values and stereo-

types in their minds, and, of course, theirsheer opportunism driven by multiple busi-ness (political-cum-economic) interests.

Thus, the real question is not abouttheir views and commitments, whateverthey are, but about their complete igno-rance of the beliefs of the other part ofsociety that makes up, by various sur-veys, between one-quarter and one-halfof the national population.

Why have the Regionals reintro-duced the red flag that is a clear irritantfor so many co-citizens?

Is it just an attempt to appease and tomobilize their Sovietophile electorate atthe cost of the perceived anti-Sovietminority? Is it a symbolic gesture toindulge Russia in exchange for some per-

sonal/corporate benefits? Is it merely amaneuver to divert public attention fromthe dramatic failures of their social andeconomic policies, from the rampant cor-ruption within their own ranks and grow-ing international criticism of their heavy-handed dealing with opposition?

Or, maybe, as Prof. Alexander Motylsuggests, it is a part of a wider strategy:to undermine the Ukrainian, i.e. largelypro-European and anti-Soviet identity,and thereby to weaken the social base ofthe Orange opponents?

All these assumptions may hold sometruth but they hardly justify the costs tobe inevitably paid for the presumed bene-fits. In long run, the Sovietophile policieswould definitely subvert Ukraines

European integration, preclude anychances to become a part of the firstworld, and deadlock it perhaps forever inthe Russia-dominated Eurasian spaceof backwardness and despotism.

This actually might not be a problemfor the ruling elite since they personal-ly joined the European Union long ago,keeping their accounts, families and realestate in the hostile West rather than infriendly Russia. But the real cost of con-tentious, divisive policies stubbornly pur-sued by the Donbas elite might be thedivision of the country at best, or itsUlsterization at worst.

One may find some disturbing analogiesbetween Russian supremacists waving redflags in western Ukrainian cities and Ulster

unionists marching with their flags throughthe Catholic quarters to celebrate the 1688historical victory and symbolic dominanceof the colonizers over the aborigines.Aborigines apparently dislike it and reactemotionally, as happened in Lviv, to thegreat joy of Moscow propagandists whorepresent Ukrainians outrage at imperialsymbols as a crypto-fascist denial of theGreat Victory and another proof of soli-darity with the defeated Nazis arguablyinherent in Western Ukraine.

Perception of past Nazi collaboratorsdivides Ukraine ran the headline ofRussia Today, the leading Kremlin mouth-piece, clearly outlining how the clashes inLviv should be interpreted for both thedomestic and international market.

Both the Russians and foreigners buy thenews at face value. Even the respectableBBC informed its readers about the clash-es between Ukrainian nationalists and pro-Russian activists, as if pro-Russiannesswas the main feature of rabidly chauvinisticand Ukrainophobic provocateurs purposelybrought to Lviv from southeastern Ukraine.The pre-war Sudetenland Nazis might havebeen labeled pro-German activists by thesame logic and with the same precision.

The Russian intent to deepen theUkrainian divide has become an obsession,along with efforts to discredit any stronganti-Soviet, pro-European Ukrainian identi-ty as rabidly anti-Russian, xenophobic andcrypto-fascist.

These intents may perfectly resonatewith the Party of Regions desire to margin-

alize the political opposition by a complextwo-fold strategy. One aspect was men-tioned already: re-Sovietization andRussification of Ukraine as a way to weak-en Ukrainian identity and undermine thepower-base of the Orange opponents. Theother aspect is aimed at promotion andcovert support of radical nationalists inwestern Ukraine in order to undermineUkrainian moderates as real political rivals

with potentially a much broader electoralbase all over the country.

But the price for this perfidious gamemight be too high. And there are somesigns that the Party of Regions, despiteappearances to the contrary, is not homog-enous and monolithic in this regard. First,President Yanukovych opted not to sign

the controversial decree on the red flagsofficial usage and relied on so-called legalexpertise. He condemned the violence inLviv and promised a determined responseto those who want to bask in a bloody firebut did not specify the culprits. In fact, hisreference to some activists [that] are try-ing again to split the Ukrainian people,and to the attempts to exploit politicallythe tragedies of the 20th century can beapplied to both sides (http://www.presi-dent.gov.ua/en/news/20032.html).

Hanna Herman, his top adviser,expressed this idea unequivocally by say-ing that the both sides of the conflictdeserve each other: (Like guests, like hosts).

Oleksandr Yefremov, the head of the par-

liamentary faction of the Party of Regions,seemed to backtrack when he stated thatprobably we have to stipulate this [the redflag official status] not by law but by parlia-mentary decree and to think more deeplyabout this matter (http://gazeta.ua/articles/politics/382050).

And the Ukrainian Ministry of ForeignAffairs responded to its Russian counterpartwith a sharp albeit wrapped in diplomaticwording call to tone down anti-Ukrainianhysteria in the Russian mass media and paymore attention to nationalistic and xenopho-bic excesses in Russia itself. The statementimplies that Russia, unlike Ukraine, has notyet got rid of politicians who earn politicaldividends through provoking tensions inbilateral relations. Still worse, someRussian politicians try to divide peoplesinto more or less worthy heirs of the victoryover fascism (http://www.mfa.gov.ua/mfa/en/publication/content/53249.htm).

Ukrainian TV, even though largelystate-controlled, covered the May 9events in Lviv in a much more balancedand moderate way than Russian TV net-works, engaged in overtly propagandisticHalychyna-bashing and anti-nationalisticwitch-hunts, in which anti-nationalism

was as subtle a substitute for anti-Ukrai-nian angst as Soviet anti-Zionism foranti-Semitism.

It is not clear yet whether we are wit-nessing some splits within the rulingteam between the pro-Moscow hawksand more pragmatic doves, or whetherthis reflects some backtracking from too

rough and assertive anti-Ukrainian poli-cies of todays mostly Russian andRussophone elite, or perhaps some hes-itation evoked by the obvious fact that re-Sovietization in Ukraine, despite initialexpectations, has not proceeded assmoothly as in Russia and Belarus.

One thing is clear, however: the genie ofRussian/Russophone nationalism inUkraine has been released from the Sovietbottle and is very unlikely to be put back.What looked like mere Sovietophile nostal-gia throughout the 1990s has been institu-tionalized recently as a vociferous politicalmovement, with very strong Russian andprobably FSB connections and even stron-ger Ukrainophobic zeal. This might be agreater challenge for any Ukrainian govern-

ment than the antithetical and ideologicalFrankenstein from the Ukrainian far rightcherished covertly by the Party of Regions.

Whatever President Yanukovych doeswith the as yet unsigned law, he willencounter a problem. The red flag has beenused already without his signature and islikely to be re-deployed in the future. Theregional authorities in Luhansk havealready declared they are not going toremove the red flags at least until June 22 the day when the Great Patriotic War began.They may well extend, in good faith, thepresence of these flags indefinitely, or evensubstitute them for the national flags.

In the longer term, they may have noneed for a national president in remote Kyiv.

Mykola Riabchuk is an author andjournali st from Ukraine, and a leadingintellectual who is affiliated with thejournal Krytyka.

The article above is reprinted from theblog Current Politics in Ukraine (http://ukraineanalysis.wordpress.com/) createdby the Stasiuk Program for the Study ofContemporary Ukraine, a program of theCanadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies atthe University of Alberta.


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Investors sue

producers of lmon Holodomor

PARSIPPANY, N.J. Investors in adocumentary about a Stalin-era genocide inUkraine are suing the films producers forfailing to release the picture, was the newscarried by The Hollywood Reporter onApril 27.

The film is Holodomor: UkrainesGenocide. And the suit was filed byEugenia Dallas, Luba Keske, NestorPopowych and Walter Keske against film-makers Bobby Leigh and Marta Tomkiwand their entity, Holodomor the Movie,LLC.

However, the group of plaintiffsdescribed by the news media as investors ismore than that. They include producers,fund-raisers and a survivor of theHolodomor the Famine-Genocide of1932-1933 in Ukraine.

Eriq Gardner of The HollywoodReporter wrote: The plaintiffs allege thefailure caused emotional distress for theUkrainian community and constituted a

fraud on all those who put up money withthe expectation that an atrocity that extermi-nated approximately 25 percent of theUkrainian population in the early 1930swould finally be recognized by the world.

The story was picked up also byCourthouse News Services EntertainmentLaw Digest, which disseminated the newson April 29.

Luba Keske, who was executive produc-er of the film, was asked by The UkrainianWeekly to comment on the suit. In a state-ment received on May 9, Ms. Keske, speak-ing on behalf of Mrs. Dallas, Mr.Popowych and Mr. Keske, said:

After four years of providing encour-agement and financial assistance to com-plete this important film project, and after

the final cut of the film was completed inlate 2009, we were left with no alternativebut to proceed seeking assistance from thelegal system. Before going to court, wemade every possible attempt to persuadeMr. Leigh and Ms. Tomkiw to complete thefinal touches of the movie with the goal ofbeing distributed to the worldwide public.Unfortunately, both participants have decid-ed not to continue our mutual goal of hav-ing the film completed.

Therefore, in order to reach this goal,namely: to have this film released with his-torical accuracy and distributed worldwide,as promised to Holodomor survivors, to thegovernment of Ukraine and, very impor-tantly, to the countless individual supportersand contributors from the U.S. and around

the world, we were required to proceedwith the present action.Reached by The Weekly, Ms. Tomkiw

wrote in a May 10 e-mail message:It is with great shock, disappointment

and a deep sadness within our hearts wetake this moment to inform the Ukrainiandiaspora that on April 25, 2011, LubaKeske, her German husband, Wally Keske,Nestor Popowych and Eugenia Dallas havefi led a lawsuit against our f i lmHolodomor: Ukraines Genocide, againstBobby Leigh, the director of the film andagainst Marta Tomkiw, the producer.

Our film, Holodomor: UkrainesGenocide, although currently viewable, isnot yet 100 percent complete in the formthat we can distribute it. We still need to

make a few technical adjustments, such ascolor correction, sound mix, post-produc-tion completion; we need to pay a few indi-viduals who are still owed money and whoworked on deferred payment. Unfortunatelyfund-raising efforts and the post-productionof our film has grown to a halt.

We, Marta Tomkiw and Bobby Leigh,cannot even begin to comprehend why

1930s and World War II, beginning withdekurkulization, then the Holodomor,and followed by the persecution of awide range of ethnic minorities, rangingfrom Poles to Tatars.

The scholar even addresses Stalinsorder to arrest more than 800,000 anti-social elements of society, such as alco-holics and prostitutes, estimating thathalf of those rounded up were eventuallymurdered.

Stalins Genocides also illustrateshow Soviet delegates lobbied for thewording of the genocide convention,ultimately adopted in 1948 by the UnitedNations General Assembly, to be restrict-ed to ethnic, national, racial and reli-gious groups, excluding social and politi-cal groups.

Some historians say that, even ifStalin had the goal of destroyingUkrainian peasants, it doesnt necessari-ly mean that he wanted to destroy thembecause they were Ukrainian, Dr.Naimark said. In this regard, I pose thequestion, What [is the] difference?

Soviet leaders realized that theUkrainian peasant wasnt going to fitinto the new social order being built bythe Soviets, which was based on ahomogenized, denationalized Soviet citi-zen, he said.

Stalin and his lieutenants used thebeginning of the Holodomor to literallybreak the backs of the Ukrainian peas-antry, and we have all the evidence andproof of this, he said.

Dr. Naimarks work also offers evi-dence that the Holodomor was a geno-cidal act that was distinct from the fam-ines that plagued the Lower Volga basinand Kazakhstan at that time, debunking aclaim that has gotten much attention and

Dr. Norman M. Naimark presented his book Stalins Genocides, translated intothe Ukrainian language, at the National University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy on

May 11.

Volodymyr Musyak

(Continued from page 1)

Translation...

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gained legitimacy among Russian aca-demia, with the Kremlins support.

The Holodomor was a very con-cealed terrorist act against the back-

ground of a general Soviet famine, yetcaused by entirely different reasons,said Dr. Stanislav Kulchytskyi, one ofUkraines top Holodomor researchers,who joined Dr. Naimark in presentingthe book.

Ukraine was already boiling beforethe smashing blow as Stalin called it

was applied. That is the essence of theHolodomor which differentiated it fromthe Kazakh and central Russian fam-ines, Dr. Kulchytskyi noted.

The day after his press conference, Dr.Naimark discussed his book with stu-dents at Kyiv Mohyla Academy, fol-lowed by a formal presentation attendedby leading Holodomor historians, suchas Dr. Yurii Shapoval, and members ofthe Ukrainian intelligentsia.

Dr. Naimark earned his three academ-ic degrees at Stanford University, whichis world renowned for its Soviet studiesdepartment. For 15 years he was a pro-

fessor of history at Boston Universityand a fellow of the Russian ResearchCenter at Harvard University.

The day before Dr. Naimarks presen-tation, Ukrainians celebrated VictoryDay, which remains a national holiday.Communists in Kharkiv hoisted upStalin portraits while marching in thecitys Victory Day parade, and the SovietOfficers Union paid for a Stalin bill-board to be hung in the ci ty of Sevastopol.

Dr. Naimark said he was startled tosee portraits of Stalin for sale among thesouvenir kiosks lining Kyivs pictur-esque Andriyivskyi Uzviz (St. AndrewsDescent). Imagine if portraits of Hitlerwere sold in such a way, he said, reveal-ing his disgust.



5/24


THEUKRAINIAN NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FORUM

THE UNA:117 YEARS OF SERVICE TO OUR COMMUNITY

SPOTLIGHT ON SOYUZIVKA:Environmental specialists on the sceneKERHONKSON, N.Y. Recently,

passers-by may have witnessed hugeexcavating equipment, cherry-pickers andconstruction crews invading the woods ofSoyuzivka. Many have wondered whathas been going on.

On March 8, a release of heating oil onSoyuzivka property was reported by amotorist to the New York Department ofEnvironment Conservation (DEC). Oilwas observed on the eastern side of theMain House on Foordmore Road. Therelease was not visible from SoyuzivkasMain House or public areas.

Roma Lisovich, UNA treasurer,reports that Soyuzivka began contain-ment efforts within hours of the notifica-tion and engaged environmental special-ists in an effort to identify the source of

the release and establish and implement a

clean-up protocol in cooperation with andresponse to the DEC.The DEC is making regular inspec-

tions of the site and, at their latest meet-ing with UNA executives, reported it ispleased with the efforts to date. StefanKaczaraj, UNA president, and Ms.Lisovich were joined by the DECinspector last week for a joint siteinspection to review the progress thathas been made.

The 24-hour continuous responseproject, ably coordinated by NestorPaslawsky, Soyuzivkas general manager,has been ongoing since March and isbeing implemented by a tireless com-bined crew of Soyzivkas own staff andspecialists.

We are focused on this round theclock. Staying on top of the situation iskey, said Mr. Paslawsky. All steps arebeing taken to contain the release.

The underground oil tanks serving theMain House had to be removed to reachthe impacted soil underneath, in compli-ance with DEC requirements. A tempo-rary oil tank has been installed and is pro-viding the Main House with heat and hot

water.The good news is that the project willnot impact the operation of the summerseason. The response site is not part ofSoyuzivkas public area and will befenced off to identify its location. Crews

will still be working throughout the nextcoming months.

As can be expected, the cost of thisresponse action requires a substantial andimmediate outlay of funds, putting a sub-stantial strain on Soyuzivkas resources.This could not have happened at a worset ime, President Kaczaraj noted.Reimbursement efforts, of course, arebeing aggressively pursued. We hope our

members will understand, be patient andsupportive.UNA executives say that they will

continue to take all the necessary stepsrequired to respond in accordance withDEC guidelines.

Officials from the New York Department of Environmental Conservation withthe UNA president and Soyuzivka manager.

Excavation equipment on the scene at Soyuzivka.

OUNs worldwide leader visits UNA headquartersby Roma Hadzewycz

PARSIPPANY, N.J . StefanRomaniw, leader of the Organization ofUkrainian Nationalists worldwide, paida visit to the headquarters of the

Ukrainian National Association here onApril 8.His stopover took place in the midst

of his tour of Ukrainian communities inthe United States, where he was to speakabout the role of the OUN in the devel-opment of Ukraine, as well as the role ofthe diaspora given present-day realitiesin Ukrainians ancestral homeland.

Mr. Romaniw, who also serves asgeneral secretary of the Ukrainian WorldCongress and is particularly active inefforts to gain worldwide recognition ofthe Holodomor as genocide targeting thepeople of Ukraine, met with UNA exec-utive officers and the editor-in-chief ofthe UNAs two newspapers, Svobodaand The Ukrainian Weekly.

He spoke about the goal of develop-ing a Ukrainian Ukraine as an alterna-tive to [President Viktor] YanukovychsUkraine. One of the ways to do this, henoted, would be to create an Institute ofPublic Affairs, a think-tank or braintrust, that would work to prepare a posi-

t ion paper on The IndependentUkrainian State: 2011 and Beyond.

The type of Ukraine that the OUNleader said he would like to see devel-oped is a Ukraine where people of vari-ous nationalities want to live, where the

people would think about what they cando for their Ukraine.Mr. Romaniw, who was elected in July

2009 to lead the OUN worldwide, visitedcommunities in Passaic, N.J., New York,Yonkers and Buffalo, N.Y., Philadelphiaand Chicago between April 7 and 17. Hesaid his aim was to engage the communi-ty in a dialogue on the topic What doesit mean in 2011 to be a nationalist?

In addition, Mr. Romaniw said hewould ask Ukrainian community mem-bers to ponder what it means to be valu-able to Ukraine and to begin a discussionabout what an independent Ukrainianstate means for the diaspora as well as thepeople of Ukraine.

He told the UNA leaders, PresidentStefan Kaczaraj, First Vice-PresidentMichael Koziupa and Treasurer RomaLisovich, as well as Editor-in-ChiefRoma Hadzewycz that he would presenthis thesis that We all have a role to playin the development of Ukraine no mat-ter where we are.

Mr. Romaniw also noted that he wouldlike to put on the agenda of the UkrainianWorld Congress a plan about how to dis-seminate information about the contribu-tions of the Ukrainian diaspora in orderto make people in Ukraine aware of its

important work.Concluding his visit to the UNA, Mr.

Romaniw agreed to be interviewed afterhe completed his tour of Ukrainian com-munities in order to share his observa-tions about his meetings.

Stefan Romaniw (second from left) with UNA executive officers (from left)Treasurer Roma Lisovich, President Stefan Kaczaraj and First Vice-President

Michael Koziupa.

Roma Hadzewycz


6/24


Perhaps it should come as no surprise that a court in Munich found JohnDemjanjuk guilty on 28,060 counts of accessory to murder one for each personwho died during the time he was ruled to have been a guard at Sobibor. After all,once it was clear the court had accepted into evidence certain controversial pieces ofevidence supplied by Soviet authorities during the Cold War the jig was up.

First, there was the infamous Trawniki identification card whose provenance andauthenticity have been questioned by numerous experts and observers of the morethan 30-year-long Demjanjuk case. The credibility of the ID card was previouslycalled into question in legal proceedings in both the United States and Israel, and thecard is suspected to be a KGB forgery for reasons too numerous to be mentioned here.

And then there was the matter of previously discredited testimony originallygiven in 1949 to Soviet authorities by one Ignat Danilchenko, who claimed to haveknown Mr. Demjanjuk in 1943 at Sobibor. In 2009, when the Demjanjuk trial wasset to begin in Germany, Danilchenko was listed among the witnesses, although hehad died in 1985 without ever being questioned about his testimony. The courtallowed the transcript of a 1979 interview with Danilchenko by a Soviet prosecutorto be read into the record over the protestations of the Demjanjuk defense. Therecontinue to be concerns the Danilchenko record could be a forgery by the SovietKGB or that it could have been obtained under duress.

It was troubling also that the Munich court repeatedly denied the defensesmotions for access to more documents, as well as additional expert witnesses on thereliability of documents from the former USSR. The courts bias is further evi-denced by their willingness to ignore the Demjanjuk investigative files still hidden in

Russia, Mr. Demjanjuks son, John Demjanjuk Jr., said in a statement in Novemberof 2010. The history of the Israeli proceeding, which nearly ended in the executionof the wrong man, should cause them to want all of the evidence available.

The courts intransigence on this matter continued even into the Munich trialsclosing days, when the Associated Press published a bombshell: An FBI report keptsecret for 25 years said the Soviet Union quite likely fabricated evidence central tothe prosecution of John Demjanjuk. A newly declassified FBI field office reportquestioned the authenticity of, yes, the Trawniki ID card a key piece of evidenceagainst Mr. Demjanjuk in the U.S. and Israel, and now in Germany. The card is all themore important because no living witnesses have placed Mr. Demjanjuk at Sobibor.

Mr. Demjanjuks attorney Ulrich Busch argued that the FBI report was com-pletely new and was not among the 100,000 pages of U.S. documents related to thecase that were received by German investigators. Dr. Busch asked the court to sus-pend his clients trial, saying he needed more time to investigate whether more suchmaterial could be found at the National Archives in Maryland, where the APunearthed the document. Inexplicably, the court denied his request.

And then there is the matter of the surprising legal precedent that has now appar-ently been established at least in Germany. As the AP reported: There was no evi-

dence that Demjanjuk committed a specific crime. The prosecution was based on thetheory that if Demjanjuk was at the camp, he was a participant in the killing thefirst time such a legal argument has been made in German courts.

It must also be noted that back in November 2009, Scott Raab wrote in Esquiremagazine: guilt and innocence, not to mention truth and justice, are beside thepoint in this case. The Germans did not bring Demjanjuk here to determine his guilt,but to assuage their own. Regardless of the verdict, the old mans fate will be thesame: Demjanjuk they brought here to die. His words appear to be prescient.

Now the Demjanjuk defense is preparing an appeal, while back in the U.S. Mr.Demjanjuks deportation case might be reopened in view of the newly uncoveredFBI report, which Federal Public Defender Dennis G. Terez argued raises a funda-mental issue of fairness. Mr. Terez asked: Why has the [U.S.] government foralmost 30 years withheld, contrary to court rule and order, documents which on theirface are plainly exculpatory and relevant?

And, so the strange case of John Demjanjuk continues into its 34th year.

The Demjanjuk verdict

The UkrainianWeekly

Ten years ago, on May 23, 2001, a memorial dedicated toHeorhii Gongadze and other slain journalists disappeared justtwo days after its installation outside the offices of the UkrainianIndependent Information Agency (UNIAN) in Kyiv.

The black marble, four-foot-high, tombstone-like monument,To the Slain Journalists of Ukraine: Fighters for the Truth, wasinscribed with names of eight journalists: Vadym Boiko,

Svatoslav Sosnovskyi, Volodymyr Ivanov, Borys Derevianko, Ihor Hrushetsky,Volodymyr Baster, Marianna Chorna and Gongadze. It was commissioned by the UkraineWithout Kuchma opposition group. Few group members believed the monument wouldremain in place for very long.

This is a national disgrace, said Volodymyr Lutsenko, who was one of the co-orga-nizers of the efforts to honor eight Ukrainian journalists first and foremost among themGongadze who the Ukraine Without Kuchma group believed were murdered because ofwhat they wrote or reported about state authorities.

Mykhailo Batih, president of the UNIAN news agency, said he witnessed 15 men in

civilian clothes lifting the monument onto a truck. The [Ukraine Without Kuchma] peo-ple had not approached us about putting the monument up, said Mr. Batih. We had verylittle contact with them on the matter, so I really did not know what to think when I sawthe thing being hauled away.

The opposition group encountered resistance from law enforcement officials whenerecting the monument, because the group had not obtained the required city permits.

National Deputy Oleksander Moroz and members of his Socialist Party appeared onMay 21, 2001, at the UNIAN site with the monument, which had just arrived from Rivne,where it had been commissioned and constructed after extensive problems.

May232001

Turning the pages back...

COMMENTARY

by Taras Kuzio

Independent Ukraine has worked withfour U.S. presidents and these can bereadily divided into two groups in termsof their policies and attitudes towardsUkraine. The most pro-Ukrainian wereDemocrat Bill Clinton and RepublicanGeorge W. Bush, while the less interestedin Ukraine, and the ones committed to aRussia-first policy were PresidentsGeorge H.W. Bush and the current presi-dent, Barack Obama.

This points to the fact that there is nota pro-Ukrainian political party in theU.S. as policies are very much dependentupon the personality of the president, thesituation on the ground and the geopoliti-cal situation during the period of time heis in office. Democrats and Republicans,therefore, have been both pro-Ukrainian

and Russia-centric.The same was true during the Cold

War.Republican U.S. Presidents Richard

Nixon and Bush (the elder) supported, inthe first case, dtente with the USSR, andin the latter, cooperation with Sovietleader Mikhail Gorbachev. Meanwhile,the greatest support given to Ukraine wasby Democratic President Jimmy Carterand especially Republican PresidentRonald Reagan, both of whom were ideo-logical presidents who competed with theUSSR over human rights, democracy,national rights, and geopolitical and mili-tary issues.

President Reagan established theNational Endowment for Democracy in

1984 and U.S. opinion polls show thatgreater numbers of Republican (thanDemocratic) voters support promotion ofdemocracy as a U.S. government objec-tive. Thats because Republicans tend tobe more in favor of the export of manifestdestiny, seeing democracy-promotion asspreading American political and eco-nomic values around the world. Ofcourse, isolationism also exists withinboth parties.

Presidents Clinton and Bush (theyounger), like Presidents Carter andReagan, also were ideological presidentscommitted to enlarging NATO to post-Communist Europe which they equatedwith expanding the zone of democracyfrom West to East. All post-Communiststates that have joined NATO have used

this as a steppingstone to join theEuropean Union.

President George W. Bush was ideo-logically committed to democracy pro-motion, whereas President Obama is lessso and this change in policy has beenwelcomed by Moscow. President ViktorYushchenko lost the best opportunity intwo decades of Ukrainian independenceto utilize support from the Bush adminis-tration to support Ukraines integrationinto trans-Atlantic structures. In April2005 I witnessed how PresidentYushchenko during his visit toWashington, where he spoke to bothhouses of Congress had the city literal-ly eating out of the palm of his hand.

The Obama administrations Russia-

first policies towards Eurasia resemblethose of the first President Bush in the

early 1990s who he had the misfortune togive what became known as the Chicken

Kiev speech to the Soviet UkrainianParliament in July 1991. But, of course,the geopolitical situation today is verydifferent for President Obama.

The Obama administrations resetpolicy with Russia has eclipsed other pol-icies towards the non-Russian states ofEurasia, including Ukraine and evenGeorgia, where reforms have taken place(unlike Ukraine). This has been advanta-geous to Russia because PresidentObama, unlike his predecessor, does notactively support NATO enlargement ormore assertive promotion of democracy.Ukraine, therefore, is less important tohis administration. The Yanukovychadministration and experts in Kyiv havefailed to understand that Ukraine is not apriority for Washington, which has farmore pressing issues to deal with(Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, etc.). Inthe post-9/11 world, the importance ofEurasia to US security has declined.

President Viktor Yanukovychs poli-cies have deepened the Russia-first poli-cies of the Obama administration bymaking Ukraine less geopoliticallyi m p o r t a n t t o W a s h i n g t o n . M r .Yanukovych is the first of four Ukrainianpresidents to not support Ukraines mem-bership in NATO and his administrationhas never explained (or outlined a strate-gy) as to how Ukraine would be the firstpost-Communist country to join the EUwithout going through NATO first.

To be fair, the Obama administrationsdisinterest in Ukraine is also an outcome

of the Ukraine fatigue that emerged in2008-2009, the primary blame for whichcan be placed upon President Yushchenko.This led to the U.S. being neutral in the2010 elections between the two main can-didates, Mr. Yanukovych and YuliaTymoshenko, which resulted in into grant-ing President Yanukovych far too long ahoneymoon until autumn of last year.

The U.S. Embassy in Kyiv initiallyexhibited too much wishful thinkingabout Mr. Yanukovych, who has neveradmitted to committing election fraud in2004 and who still believes he was freelyelected that year but was denied the presi-dency through a joint conspiracy by theCIA and President Leonid Kuchma.

The U.S. should have looked more

closely at Mr. Yanukovychs track recordas he has presided over four electionfrauds as Donetsk governor (1999, 2002),prime minister (2004) and president(2010). Indeed, free elections and Mr.Yanukovych are about as compatible ashorseradish and borsch.

The Russia-first policy of the Obamaadministration does not mean thatWashington has fundamentally changedits stance towards Ukraine. OrestDeychakiwsky of the U.S. HelsinkiCommiss ion notes : The ObamaAdministrations policies towards Ukrainebroadly track with those of previousadministrations: there is support forUkraines independence and democracy,as frustrating as that may be given thatUkraines ruling elites often have acted in

ways that give cause for questioning theircommitment to Ukraines well-being.W i t h r e s p e c t t o t h e O b a m aAdministration, there is good practicalcooperation on various security and eco-nomic issues (such as highly enriched ura-nium and Chornobyl, although the admin-istration is rightly concerned and could

Eurasia, including Ukraine, no longerstrategic priority under Obamas reset


Taras Kuzio is an Austrian MarshallPlan Foundation visiting fellow, Centerfor Transat lanti c Relations , School ofAdvanced International Studies , JohnsHopkins University, Washington. He iseditor of Ukraine Analyst and can bereached at www.taraskuzio.net.(Continued on page 21)


7/24


Make no mistake, Canadas politi-cal parties supporting issues dear tothe Ukrainian Canadian communityscored in the recent federal election.Those that didnt were tufted out.

A political disaster descended onthe Liberal Party of Canada. I td r o p p e d t o 3 4 s e a t s o u t o f Parliaments total of 308 an unprec-edented defeat for the countrys oldestparty, which had dominated Canadianpolitics for over 150 years. BlocQubcois, the party seeking exodusfrom Canada was tufted out, reducedto four seats.

Th e c l e a r wi n n e r s we r e t h eConservatives, gaining 24 new seatsfor a total of 167. They now have aclear majority. But the surprising vic-tory came to the social ist NewDemocratic Party. Nearly obliteratedseveral elections ago, it surged to win102 seats including an ex-Commu-nist who won against Canadas for-eign minister to become, for the firsttime in history, the official opposition.

So what happened? And what is theUkrainian Canadian connection?

Briefly, having led Canada througha global economic downturn relativelyunscathed strong banks, a boominghousing market, strong employmentfigures Prime Minister Stephen

Harper was handed the majori tydenied him since he became primeminister five years ago. The Liberals,w h o h a v e t r a d e d w i t h t h eConservatives between governing orleading the opposition since Canadawas founded in 1867 and gave Canadasuch leaders as Pierre Tudeau andJean Chrtien, lost primarily due totheir inept leader, Michael Ignatieff.

Despite the hype he was por-trayed as sophisticated, worldly andintellectual Mr. Ignatieff failed toshine in creative policy, sharp messag-es or debates. Canadians were leftpuzzled by his rhetoric, strong on elo-cutions, but weak on substance.

He was in political hot water withthe Ukrainian Canadian communityfrom the get-go. Parachuted as a can-didate into a riding where the commu-nity held significant membership andwas fielding a candidate, questionableshortcuts in the election process hitmain street media. In his little bookBlood and Belonging he slurredUkrainians, then failed to redeem him-self when he issued a half-apology.

This cavalier, damn-the-conse-quences behavior was not the onlyUkrainian factor to influence vot-ing. Consider the following.

The Ukrainian Canadian Congress,an umbrella grouping of some 1.2 mil-lion Canadians of Ukrainian origin,conducted a pre-election survey todetermine party positions on Canadian

values important to the Ukrainiancommunity.

The NDP filled the blanks and,cleverly, wished Ukrainians a fineE a s t e r i n U k r a i n i a n . T h eConservatives set out their pro-humanrights record: celebrating the 25thanniversary of the fall of the BerlinWall, facilitating the Monument toVictims of Communism in Canadas

capital, and becoming a global leaderin recognizing the Holodomor, theartificial famine orchestrated by theKremlin in 1933 that starved some 10million Ukrainians, as a genocide.

These two parties now form theopposi t ion and the government ,respectively.

Meanwhile, the Bloc Qubcoisadvised that, due to time constraints,it responds only to surveys that serveits self-interest! The bloc is history.

The Liberals, Mr. Ignatieffs party,provided elaborative notes. Forexample, it opined that Ukraines

European integration was dependenton what Ukraines people wanted,when a simple yes or no sufficed. Thiswas a safe political response but inad-equate in the face of Russias pres-sure, on such members as France andGermany, to keep Ukraine out ofEurope. The response suggested that,if elected, Mr. Ignatieff would lead aCanada that would do little but standback were Ukraine to follow Russiainto Soviet-era recidivism.

Th e n c a m e t h e k i c k e r . M r .Ignatieffs Liberals chose the wrongside of a high-stakes Canadian valuesdebate. The proposed less than equi-table treatment of the Holodomor atthe Canadian Museum for HumanRights is an issue that makes theblood boil of many fair-minded citi-zens. They see such treatment as reac-tionary and un-Canadian, as a positionthat will not only undermine an insti-tution devoted to equility and inclu-sivity but also Canadas reputation asa global human rights leader.

The UCC survey indicated that theLiberals would not attempt to dictateto the museum board how to displayissues. In doing so the party con-fused key Canadian values withmicromanagement their word aserious faux pas for any politicalparty, especially one that stands forl iberal ism. The party that gaveCanada and the world multicultural-ism, a policy dedicated to equal treat-

ment, backed off in favor of indepen-dent management. In other words,unfair treatment is okay providing itsmanaged well.

Mr. Ignatieffs mishandling of theissues dear to the hearts of theUkrainian community was an arrogantdismissal of, to his mind, an insignifi-cant or, as he might describe, themlittle group, despite the efforts ofBorys Wrzesnewskyj, who soldieredperhaps harder than most to balancethe missteps of his leader.

Mr. Wrzesnewskyj lost his seat by20 votes and will be greatly missed.You heard it here first: he should runfor the partys leadership.

Other Canadians saw through Mr.

Ignatieffs disdain and on election dayvoted him into political oblivion.Unfortunately, he dragged many goodpeople along with him. Now he isgoing to a prestigious University ofToronto school to teach young mindshow he did it. Good grief!

Dismissing Ukrainian issues leads

to bad Canadian election results

From a Canadian Angleby Oksana Bashuk Hepburn

Oksana Bashuk Hepburn may becontacted at [email protected].

The Canadian Museum for HumanRights (CMHR) in Winnipeg, first pro-posed to the federal government of Canadain 2000 by Jewish millionaire Israel Asper,seemed like a splendid idea.

The goal was to explore the subject ofhuman rights, with special but not exclu-sive reference to Canada, in order toenhance public understanding of humanrights, to promote respect for others, and toencourage reflection and dialogue. One ofthe permanent galleries was to be devotedto the plight of Canadas First Nations peo-ples. So far so good.

When it was revealed that the other per-manent gallery was to focus on theHolocaust, Canadas Ukrainians, led by theUkrainian Canadian Congress, suggested

the inclusion of the Holodomor as stillanother permanent gallery. UkrainianCanadians also suggested the inclusion ofCanadas internment camps during the firstworld war.

Moe Levy, executive director of theAsper Foundation, prime sponsor of theCMHR, seemed to agree. In an April 11,2003, letter to UCC President Paul M.Grod and to Andrew Hladyshevsky of theUkrainian Canadian Foundation of TarasShevchenko, Mr. Levy acknowledged thatthe Famine-Genocide will be featuredvery clearly, distinctly and permanently inthe CMHR...We will work with your orga-nization to ensure that this is accom-plished. He also agreed that the WorldWar I internment should be included. Itsoon became clear, however, that only theHolocaust would be featured permanently.

Dr. Lubomyr Luciuk, current researchdirector of the Ukrainian Canadian CivilLiberties Association (UCCLA) suggestedthat one of 12 galleries be devoted exclu-sively to the thematic treatment of geno-cide in general, with no groups sufferingbeing elevated above all others in theCMHR. An April UCCLA news releasenoted that a UCCLA-commissioned NanosResearch poll demonstrated that an over-whelming majority of Canadians (60.3 per-cent from all regions, ages and votergroups) favored this approach. TheUCCLA release also mentioned that theCMHR board of trustees was largelyunrepresentative of Canadas multiculturalsociety.

What really got things riled up was anearlier open letter to the UCCLA, the UCCand the CMHR, published in the JewishCanadian press and elsewhere, accusingthe UCCLA and the UCC of campaigningagainst the plans of the Canadian Museumfor Human Rights in Winnipeg to mount apermanent Holocaust gallery. The letterwas critical of the UCC for suggesting thatthe Holodomor should receive no lesscoverage... than the Holocaust and forhaving distorted historical accounts of theHolodomor while at the same time refusingto acknowledge the Ukrainian nationalistmovements role in the Holocaust, specif-ically the role of the Organization ofUkrainian Nationalists, the UkrainianInsurgent Army (UPA) and the Waffen-SS14th Grenadier Division in the murder ofPoles and Jews. Say what?

The letter was signed by 78 intellectualsfrom Canada, as well as from the UnitedStates, Israel, France, England, Ukraine,Germany, Lithuania, Ireland, Austria andRussia. Included were well-knownUkrainophobes Efraim Zuroff and DavidMatas, as well as Ukrainian CanadiansMarco Carynnyk, Prof. John Paul Himka.and Myrna Kostash.

It should be noted that Ms. Kostashauthored a 2009 piece in the LiteraryReview of Canada in which she wrotethat the Holodomor was a vast tragedy,but hardly a genocide. Cited as one of hersources, was Fraud, Famine andFascism: The Ukrainian Genocide Mythfrom Hitler to Harvard by the pro-Sovietauthor, Douglas Tottle. Ms. Kostashsinspiration for the article, she happilyadmitted, came after auditing a coursetitled Topics in Ukrainian Historytaught by Prof. Himka.

The UCC responded to the letter bylabeling the accusations malicious andprejudicial, intended to defame thereputation of the UCC and its leader-ship. The UCCLA rejected the letter as

deceitful and slanderous, and ques-tioned the propriety of foreigners com-menting on a Canadian national museum.How we spend our tax dollars, and howa Canadian national museum is governed,and what should be in it are matters forCanadians to decide our business, nottheirs, the UCCLA noted.

A blistering academic response camefrom Prof. Roman Serbyn, who dissectedthe letter paragraph by paragraph, labelingit as mendacious and contradictory.One does not have to be a specialist in thefields in which the signatories claim exper-tise, to see that the presentation of theactivities of OUN, UPA and the Division isone-sided and therefore lacking in scholar-ly integrity, he wrote. All the atrocities

are attributed to the Ukrainian side in thePolish-Ukrainian conflict, Jews are shownas being only persecuted and never savedby Ukrainians...

One wonders. Is it possible that so manynon-Canadians are suddenly deeply dis-tressed about a museum in Canada? MarcoLevytsky, editor and publisher ofUkrainian News, a Canadian newspaperdistributed throughout Canada, thinks heknows the answer. In his open letter on thesubject, Mr. Levytsky suggests that Dr.Himka and one of his former students, PersRudling, may have collaborated in com-posing the letter. Mr. Levtytsky then goeson to quote from a paper titled The JewishCard in Russian Special OperationsAgainst Ukraine by Moses Fishbein,delivered at the University of Illinois inJune 2009: The claim that UPA engagedin anti-Jewish actions is a provocationengineered by Moscow... Tell me: howcould the UPA have destroyed Jews whenJews were serving members of UPA?

Prof. Himka responded by questioningthe sources cited by Mr. Levytsky, claim-ing that OUN and promoters of OUN andUPA like Marco Levytsky have to resort tofalsifications, which indicates their lack ofreal evidence.

Millions of federal and local dollarshave already been allocated for theCMHR, but the battle is far from over.Prof. Luciuk, believes it has merelyreached a temporary lull.

Personally, I am not surprised by the lin-gering tensions in Canada. Prof. Timothy

Snyder had it right when he wrote recentlythat the Holocaust disfigures the naturalreflex to make sense of the past... MustEuropean history of the first half of the20th century forever be viewed through theprism of the Holocaust? Good question.

Myron Kuropass e-mail address [email protected].

Canadian capers


8/24


The Meaning of Chernobyl, byYulia Tymoshenko, Moscow Times,April 25:

none of us knew the precisemoment when catastrophe struck atChernobyl [sic] 25 years ago. Back then,we lived under a system that denied ordi-nary people any right whatsoever toknow about even essential facts andevents. So we were kept in the dark aboutthe radiation leaking from the shatteredreactor at Chernobyl and blowing inthe winds over northern Europe.

But the more bizarre fact about theChernobyl disaster, we now know, is thatMikhail Gorbachev, then-general secre-tary of the Communist Party, was alsokept in the dark about the magnitude ofthe disaster. Indeed, it may be this veryfact that finally condemned the old sys-tem to the dustbin of history a mere fiveyears later. No regime built on limitlessself-delusion is capable of retaining ashred of legitimacy once the scale of itsself-deception is exposed.

unlike Japans Fukushima nuclearcrisis, Chernobyls real lesson is notabout nuclear-plant safety. It is aboutofficial arrogance and indifference to suf-

fering and a cult of secrecy that allowsinformation to be shared only among anarrow elite obsessed with stability.

Indifference means that noresponse to injustice and no help for thesuffering will ever come. It is the tool ofgovernments that are, in fact, the enemyof their people, for it benefits only theruler never the victim, whose pain ismagnified by neglect.

This is perhaps the central lessonof Chernobyl: Governments that system-atically turn a blind eye to their citizensfate ultimately condemn themselves.

Continuing Questions AboutChernobyl, editorial, The New YorkTimes, May 10:

It has been 25 years since the worstnuclear power accident in history at theChernobyl [sic] plant in Ukraine, and westill arent certain what health damage itmay ultimately cause. That gap needs tobe filled by a vigorous research program

both to improve readiness to cope withanother bad nuclear accident and toenhance understanding of the long-termeffects of low doses of radiation.

international health authoritieshave found the damage from falloutdownwind to be far less than originallyfeared.

Critics have long contended that suchestimates downplayed the dangers. Nowa panel of experts assembled at therequest of the European Commission isalso calling for a wider look. It cited scat-tered reports, many appearing in leadingscientific journals, suggesting that

Chernobyls radiation might be increas-ing the risk of breast cancer, various othercancers, and immunological abnormali-ties, among other effects.

The panel suggested that a researchfoundation be established to conductlong-term studies much as a foundationin Japan has been studying the long-termeffects of the bombings of Hiroshima andNagasaki. It is a very good idea.

IN THE PRESS: Chornobyl

Both accidents, which have been clas-sified as level 7 nuclear accidents accord-ing to the International Atomic EnergyAgency scale, serve as alerts from thefuture about the possible failures ofcomplex and vulnerable technologicalsuper systems, he said. Both disasters,

with their unpredictably severe conse-quences destroyed the optimisticallyirresponsible myth of the nuclear industrycomplex.

Quoting numerous statistics, Dr.Shcherbak emphasized the enormousscale of the Chornobyl accident .Chornobyl radiation levels were at least100 times bigger than the two atombombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, hesaid. Precipitation from Chornobyl cloudsaffected territories populated by 3 billionpersons. Thirteen European countries saw50 percent of their territory dangerouslypolluted with Chornobyl radioactivenuclides and eight countries had 30 per-cent of their territory similarly affected.

Some 5 million people live today in

the areas of Ukraine, Belarus and Russiacontaminated with radioactive nuclides,he continued, representing an area similarin size to the combined territory ofBelgium and Austria. In Ukraine, theexplosion resulted in radioactive contam-ination of 2,294 villages and small towns,and more than 2.3 million individuals,including 643,000 children, have beengiven the status of Chornobyl sufferers.

Although the full impact of theFukushima explosion is still unfolding,Dr. Shchercbak pointed out that radioac-tive clouds have already reachedCalifornia.

The Chornobyl accident permanentlychanged the flora and fauna of northernUkraine and affected the health of count-

less individuals. Even though Dr.

Chornobyls No. 4 reactor and to financethe construction of a new shell. At thesame time, Japan is facing the necessityof constructing steel walls to protect the

sea from further contamination and anestimated $170 billion to pay for othercontainment and remediation.

The estimated $250 billion Ukrainehas spent on Chornobyl remediationexhausted the countrys finances anddamaged the economy, he remarked.More than 600,000 clean-up workers,soldiers, engineers, scientists and medicalpersonnel participated in emergencyactivities in the contaminated territories.Some 2,500 doctors and 5,000 nurseswere employed and approximately 400special medical units were formed, hesaid.

Dr. Shcherbak said he is convinced theaccident was a precipitating factor in theultimate dissolution of the Soviet Union

and that it continues to serve as a lessonon the destabilizing forces of mass catas-trophes. Soviet authorities initially hidthe scale of the disaster from their owncitizens and the international community,even encouraging unprotected children totake part in May Day parades in theaffected areas.

This kind of disinformation and theresulting widespread revulsion and cyni-cism destroyed the credibility of theSoviet system, he concluded, while alsopointing out that, even in democraticcountries, public authorities tend to mini-mize the scale of disasters to avoid gener-ating mass panic, as evidenced in theaftermath of the Hurricane Katrina andnow the Fukushima catastrophe.

Similar disasters in poor countrieswould easily lead to chaos, loss of sover-eignty and international destabilization,he said. Under worst-case scenarios,nuclear disasters caused by accident orterrorism would have devastating conse-quences for world populations and inter-national peace. He posed the question:What would happen if there was a nucle-ar accident in Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia,the Chechen Republic or parts of Africa?

Emphasizing that the most importantlesson of both accidents is the necessityto create a new international reliable leg-islative and normative basis regulatingmanagement of nuclear and radiationsafety, Dr. Shcherbak concluded thathumankind is facing a critical choicetoday: How do we ensure world energy

supplies without new Chornobyls andFukushimas?

Researchers receive awards

The next speaker, Dr. Damon Arnold,director of the Illinois Department ofPublic Health, emphasized the need tofund research and provide support to thevictims of both nuclear disasters so theirlives dont receive a second tragedy.

He also commended the organizers of theconference and the many individuals, likeDr. Hryhorczuk, who have devoted theirlives to serve others.

Dr. Hryhorczuk, professor emeritus atthe University of Illinois School of PublicHealth, and his longtime colleague Dr.Irina Dardynskaia, research associate pro-fessor at UIC School of Public Health,were then presented with awards from theKyiv Committee of Chicago Sister CitiesInternational for their continuous, prin-cipled and dedicated work on the healtheffects of the Chornobyl disaster on pop-ulations in Ukraine and Belarus.

Dr. Hryhorczuk began working onChornobyl in 1992 as part of the WorldBank Environmental Mission to Ukraine.He has served as an advisor to UkrainesMinistry of Health and the U.S. NationalCancer Institute on the health conse-quences of the Chornobyl accident.

For the past 15 years, Dr. Hryhorczukhas been the principal investigator on aU.S. National Institutes of Health Fogartygrant that supported research training onenvironmental health issues, includingChornobyl, in Ukraine, Belarus andRussia. For the past decade, he and hisresearch team in Ukraine have provideddata management support to the U.S.National Cancer Institute research pro-gram on Thyroid Cancer in ChildrenFollowing the Chornobyl ReactorAccident.

Dr. Dardynskaia, associate director ofthe University of Fogarty programs inRussia, Belarus and Ukraine, has beenresearching Chornobyl health issues since1987, initially as associate professor atthe Belarusian Research Institute ofRadiation Medicine and as the healthteam leader in the Belarusian-led projectthat first presented on-site assessments ofChornobyls effects on in-utero exposedchildren.

For the past 23 years, Dr. Dardynskaiaand her collaborators in Belarus andRussia have been studying health effectsof Chornobyl on women and children. Dr.Dardynskaia also served as the principalU.S. investigator of studies of breast can-cer in women of Belarus and the healtheffects of radiation exposure in childrenexposed to Chornobyl accident while inutero.

Finally, Dr. Hryhorczuk presented IhorMasnyk, Ph.D., retired head of theChornobyl Research Unit, National

Cancer Institute, with an award from theUkrainian Academy of Medical Sciencesfor his outstanding 46-year career withthe National Cancer Institute and espe-cially for his dedicated work in designingand implementing the NCI Chornobylresearch program, which included popu-lations in Ukraine and Belarus.

(Continued from page 1)

Chicago community...

Shcherbak admitted that the number ofdirect Chornobyl fatalities remains con-troversial, with estimates ranging from 30to 100,000, he left no doubt that the vic-

tims are numerous.More than 20,000 families are receiv-

ing welfare payments due to the loss oftheir breadwinners, he said. More than4,300 Ukrainians, primarily children,have been operated on for thyroid cancer.Many others are suffering from chronicfa t igue syndrome, or so-ca l l edChornobyl AIDS, and a previouslyunknown pathology of the muscular skel-etal system in children has also beenlinked to Chornobyl, he reported.

Accidents of the magnitude of Chornobyl and Fukushima place enor-mous burdens on a countrys technical,civic and financial resources, Dr.Shcherbak said, and Ukraine is still strug-gling to contain the radioactivity leaking

through the makeshift shelter over

Broadcaster Bill Kurtis introducesthe documentary film Block Four:

Chornobyl 2011.

Walter Tun

(left to right): Filmmakers Julian Hayda and the Rev. Myron Panchuk, photogra-pher Luba Markewycz and Consul Uichiro Nakano of the Consulate General of

Japan in Chicago.

Lialia Kuchma



9/24



10/24


Sisters of St. Basil the Great 100 years of service in the New WorldFOX CHASE MANOR, Pa. As part

of the centennial of the arrival of theSisters of St. Basil the Great to the UnitedStates, symposium, The Sisters of St.Basil the Great 100 Years of Service inthe New World, was held on Friday, April30, at the Basilian Spirituality Center in

Fox Chase Manor, Pa.The organizers of the event were: theSisters of the Order of St. Basil the Great,St. Sophia Religious Association ofUkrainian Catholics in U.S.A., and theShevchenko Scientific Society inPhiladelphia.

The symposium was opened with aprayer service celebrated by the Very Rev.Daniel Troyan, chaplain at the HolyTrinity Chapel, followed by words of wel-come extended by Sister Dorothy AnnBusowski, OSBM, provincial superior,who expressed her gratitude to the orga-nizers and speakers of the event.

The moderator of Session 1, NicholasRudnytzky of the St. Sophia ReligiousAssociation, quoted an excerpt from the

speech by Sister Maria Kish, OSBM, for-mer provincial superiors on the occasionof 75th anniversary of the Basilian Sistersin the U.S. in which she compared the sis-ters to a precious diamond, a beautiful andunbreakable jewel of the Ukrainiannational spirit and spirituality.

This idea was developed by the firstspeaker, the Very Rev. Dr. Ivan Kaszczak,former chaplain of the Basilian Sisters, inhis presentation, Blessed Is She, WhoBelieves. He focused on love as the per-petuum mobile of the sisters life andmission. The perfect example of such ded-icated and sacrificial love can be found inthe image of the Blessed Virgin Mary,who, regardless of unbearable pain andsuffering she endured at the Crucifixion of

her Son, said the Rev. Kaszczak.

Father Kaszczak set the historical back-ground of the sisters arrival in the NewWorld in 1911, and described the chal-lenges of their first years in the U.S. Thepioneer sisters from Yavoriv (Ukraine)shared with the Most Rev. Soter Ortynsky,OSBM, first bishop of the UkrainianCatholic Church in America, many diffi-culties. Among them were: animosityfrom the Latin hierarchy; lack of adminis-trative organization of the RuthenianGreek-Catholic Church; financial prob-lems; demoralization of the younger gen-eration; great number of homeless orphansand many more.

With great sacrificial love the Sistersdedicated themselves to the service ofthose in need, said Father Kaszczak. They

Sisters of St. Basil the Great and speakers at the symposium marking the centennial of their arrival in the United States.

Evhen Partyka

worked at the orphanage of the Cathedral

of the Immaculate Conception inPhiladelphia, subsequently developing afirm foundation of Catholic education inthe area. Their contribution to the life ofthe Ukrainian Catholic Church and com-munity are yet to be discovered, he con-cluded.

In her lecture titled Through Work andPrayer the Dream made Manifest ManorCollege, Anna Maksymowych introducedthe audience to the history of thisrenowned educational institution, estab-lished in 1947 through the efforts ofMother Josaphata Teodorowych, OSBM.

I n i t i a l l y n a m e d S t . M a c r i n aCollege, the institution opened with a stu-dent body of 11 young women. It waschartered and incorporated into the higher

education system of the Commonwealthof Pennsylvania in 1959. Manor expand-ed its facilities to include dormitories anda library. In 1977 the Ukrainian HeritageStudies Center (UHSC) was established topreserve, promote and perpetuateUkrainian culture and traditions througheducational and cultural programs. Inaddition to a folk art collection, the UHSCmaintains an extensive Ukrainian libraryand archives.

Today, Manor College has an enroll-ment of 900 students with access to anextensive and varied curriculum, as wellas a two-year associate degree program.Through a participatory form of govern-ment, Manor encourages communicationamong all the constituencies of its aca-demic community. The college is gov-erned by a board of trustees, consisting ofboth lay and religious members.

The college confers the Associate in Artand the Associate in Science degrees inthe liberal arts, transfer and career-orient-ed programs. Certificates and diplomas arelikewise conferred in various areas ofstudy.

In light of its Basilian tradition, Manorprovides students equal opportunity, with-out discrimination, to benefit from its edu-cational experience. With their prayers andsteadfast work, the Basilian Sisters havefulfilled their dream in America a dreamthat the entire Ukrainian communionshould be proud of, concluded Ms.Maksymowych.

Following a brief intermission, the

moderator of Session II, YaroslawZalipsky, chair of the ShevchenkoScientific Society in Philadelphia, intro-duced Roman Dubenko, who shared histhoughts on The Sisters of St. Basil theGreat in the Lives of Youth. From hisown perspective as a son of DP (displacedperson) parents, he acknowledged the pro-found impact the Basilian Sisters had onhis upbringing, outlook and education.

The discipline cultivated in the Basilian

schools helped him, Mr. Dubenko said, tomake a clear distinction between rightand wrong, and to understand valuesthat he is passing on to his own children.

Alexander Lushnycky delivered hispresentation on a little-known topic:Publishing: The Most Precious Legacy ofthe Sisters of St. Basil the Great. He dis-played a collection of some 45 uniquepublications books, calendars, and news-papers thus setting the historical back-ground of the Basilian printing service.Bishop Ortynsky realized the importanceof publications for multifaceted develop-ment of his flock; thus, in 1912, hebrought the America newspaper toPhiladelphia and placed it under the super-vision of the Basilian Sisters. This was

followed by the transfer of the CathedralOrphanage Printing House to them in1913.

After his death in 1916, the Sistersestablished the Misionar, a Catholicmonthly magazine, and published schoolbooks, initially in Ukrainian, and subse-quently, in both English and Ukrainian,always responding the needs of the timeand the community. The speaker empha-sized the significant role of these publica-tions played in spreading the spirit ofknowledge and in preserving the spiritual-ity of the Ukrainian people.

The Ukrainian Weekly 2011-21

Documents

Transcript of The Ukrainian Weekly 2011-21