The Ukrainian Weekly 2011-15

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

$1/$2 in UkraineVol. LXXIX No. 15 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, APRIL 10, 2011TheUkrainianWeekly

InsIde:

The Kuchma inquiry: about murder or politics? page 3. Community honors Montreal journalist page 8. Garden Party raises $14,000 for Plast camp page 10.

Ontario establishes annual Ukrainian Heritage DayTORONTO The Ontario Provincial

Parliament on March 24 passed a billthat proclaims September 7 each year asUkrainian Heritage Day.

Bill 155, the Ukrainian Heritage DayAct, proclaims an annual UkrainianHeritage Day in the province of Ontario.During the debate of the UkrainianHeritage Day Act, members of all threeparties Progressive Conservative,Liberal and New Democratic rose tovoice their support of the bill and toreflect upon the many contributions thatUkrainian Canadians have made toOntario.

The preamble to the bill notes:The first official Ukrainian immi-

grants, Vasyl Eleniak and Ivan Pylypiw,arrived in Canada on September 7, 1891.Soon afterwards, Ukrainian immigrantsbegan arriving in Ontario in larger num-bers and today Ontario is home to morethan 336,000 Ukrainian Canadians.There are over 1.2 million Canadians ofUkrainian descent across the country.

Many Ukrainians fled their home-land to find freedom from oppressionand a better life in Canada. Both Ontarioand Canada, by way of the HolodomorMemorial Day Act, 2009, and theUkrainian Famine and Genocide

(Holodomor) Memorial Day Act(Canada), have recognized the genocideby famine that occurred in Ukraine from1932 to 1933 under the Soviet

Communist regime led by Joseph Stalin.On August 24, 1991, the UkrainianParliament declared Ukraine as an inde-pendent democratic state from the SovietUnion. Canada was the first nation in theWestern world to recognize Ukrainesindependence.

Ontarians of Ukrainian descent haveleft and continue to leave a historicmark on our province. Their contribu-tions span communities across Ontarioand are reflected in our economic, polit-ical, social and cultural life. UkrainianCanadians have played an importantrole in the development of Ontario intoone of the most desirable places in theworld to live and have contributed tomaking Canada the great country that itis today. It is important to recognize andcelebrate these contributions.

On March 30 the Ukrainian CanadianCongress congratulated the legislaturein the province of Ontario and theUkrainian Canadian Congress OntarioProvincial Council (UCC-OPC) on thepassage of Canadas first UkrainianHeritage Day.

In the context of the 120th anniversa-ry of Ukrainian settlement in Canada, itis appropriate for governments toacknowledge the role of Ukrainians as

nation-builders in settling this country,stated UCC National President PaulGrod. In this regard, I would like tocongratulate Gerry Martiniuk, MPP(Cambridge) for introducing the bill, andco-sponsors Donna Cansfield, MPP(Etobicoke Centre) and Cheri DiNovo,MPP (Parkdale-High Park). We arepleased that all parties supported thisimportant legislation.

Mr. Grod also congratulated UCCOntario Provincial Council PresidentYvan Baker and his executive on theirhard work in making this very importantinitiative a reality. He added, In this120th anniversary of UkrainianCanadian settlement, we encourage thefederal government and provinces totake measures to properly recognize thecontribution of Ukrainians to buildingCanada.

The Ukrainian Canadian Congress isthe voice of Canadas 1.2 million-strongUkrainian community. The Congressbrings together under one umbrella allthe national, provincial and localUkrainian Canadian organizations.

by Zenon Zawada

Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV The learning curve for newlyappointed Major Archbishop SviatoslavShevchuk has already begun. After heboldly declared he would ask PopeBenedict XVI to consider granting the

Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church patri-archal status, he opted for a tactfulapproach when meeting face-to-face.

He acknowledged that he didnt men-tion at all the Churchs decades-long pur-suit of a patriarchate during his March31 private audience with the pontiff,which he described as brief.

There wasnt and wont be excessiveimportunity on this matter, from our end.We will work, Major ArchbishopShevchuk told the British BroadcastingCorp. (BBC) in an interview publishedthe same day. Our visit to the holyfather didnt have as its goal raising theissue about the patriarchate or our long-standing attempts for such developmentand complet ing the status of ourChurch.

His stance was quite different just twodays earlier in Kyiv, however, when hewas asked by a correspondent from theFirst National Television Network whathe planned to discuss with the PopeBenedict XVI.

Obviously we prepared very manypoints at the Synod which we must pres-ent to the holy father. Truly we will say

that we are that Church which is devel-oping, and each Eastern Church which isdeveloping is moving towards a patri-

archate, because a patriarchate is a natu-ral completion of the development of thisChurch, the major archbishop said athis first official press conference, heldon March 29. He was referring to theSynod of Bishops held March 21-24.

The sudden reversal revealed that theotherwise talented major archbishop hasalready begun the process of learning theropes of politics and the media, as indi-cated by both clergy and laity.

Major Archbishop Shevchuk wasaccompanied by several bishops on hisfive-day visit to Rome, includingArchbishop-Metropolitan Stefan Sorokaof the Philadelphia Archeparchy, BishopPaul Patrick Chomnycky of the StamfordEparchy, and Bishop Ken Nowakowski

of the New Westminster Eparchy.The entourage of bishops agreed thatraising the issue of a patriarchate whenpresenting the major archbishop for thefirst time would have been prema-ture, Archbishop Soroka told TheWeekly.

It would have been unwise, and

by Zenon Zawada

Kyiv Press Bureau

STRYI, Ukraine. The worldsUkrainian Catholics turned their attentionto Kyiv on March 27 for the enthrone-ment of their new leader, Major

Meeting with pope, UGCC leaderomits patriarchal issue, for now

A bittersweet day for StryiTown mourns one hierarch and celebrates another

(Continued on page 17)

Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk,patriarch of the Ukrainian Greek-

Catholic Church.

Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church

Father Andrii Soroka (left) of Poland and Bishop Taras Senkiv lead the funeralprocession in Stryi on March 26 for Bishop Yulian Gbur.

Zenon Zawada


Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk. Yet itwas the day before, in his native city ofStryi in the Lviv Oblast, that provedexceptionally symbolic for the UkrainianCatholic Church.


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No. 15THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, APRIL 10, 20112

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President to meet all denominations

KYIV President Viktor Yanukovychtold journalists on April 5 in Pavlohradthat he intends to meet with representa-tives of all the denominations, reportsthe Institute of Religious Freedom withreference to the press service of the headof the state. It has long been my dream,but such a meeting with representativesof all the denominations has not beenheld so far. I will make efforts to do it onHoly Thursday, April 21, on the eve ofthe Feast of Light, Easter, said the pres-ident. Speaking about relations betweenthe Church and state, the presidentstressed: The role of the state is not tointerfere in the affairs of the Church. Atthe same time, we should provide equalconditions for the development of all thedenominations. The state policy willalways promote that. During the pastyear, the All-Ukrainian Council ofChurches and Religious Organizations,as well as a number of heads of

Churches, repeatedly cal led uponPresident Yanukovych to renew theChurch-state dialogue at the highestlevel. (Religious Information Service ofUkraine)

New UGCC leader visits Rome

ROME Almost immediately afterhis enthronement ceremony in Kyiv,Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchukand several members of the PermanentSynod of Bishops of the UkrainianGreek-Catholic Church traveled toRome, where they were received in audi-ence by Pope Benedict XVI. On April 3the new leader of the UGCC celebratedthe divine liturgy of the Fourth Sundayof Great Lent, also called the Sunday ofSt. John Climacus, at the Church of St.Sophia in Rome, together with a largenumber of bishops and priests of hisChurch, as well as Cardinal LeonardoSandri, the prefect of the Congregationof the Oriental Churches. The church isattached to the Ukrainian Greek-CatholicUniversity of St. Clement, but was fartoo small to accommodate the largenumber of faithful who were present forthis signal event in the history of their

Church. A sanctuary was set up on thesteps of the building, and the faithfulstood close by in the large open space infront of it. The choir was formed ofpriests and seminarians. (ReligiousInformation Service of Ukraine)

Kuchma has another lawyer

KYIV Former President LeonidKuchma (1994-2005) said on April 4 thatlawyer Viktor Petrunenko will be part ofhis defense team in the criminal caseopened against him. My lawyer wasallowed to study [the criminal case], hesaid on leaving another round of ques-tioning at the Procurator GeneralsOffice. Mr. Petrunenko was brought in asa defense lawyer in the criminal caseopened against Mr. Kuchma in place ofIhor Fomin, who was not allowed by theProcurator Generals Office to defend theex-president. Mr. Fomin had been with-drawn from participation in the caseunder a decision by the investigator, as it

was established that in October 2003, hedefended Oleksii Pukach (the InternalAffairs Ministry general accused of kill-ing Gongadze) during consideration ofan appeal lodged against a court ruling toopen a criminal case against him. Inaccordance with the requirements of thecriminal procedure law, a lawyer cannotparticipate in the case as a defenderwhen he provides or earlier providedlegal assistance to another person, whoseinterests contradict each other, the PGOsaid. Mr. Petrunenko is known for beinga lawyer in civil lawsuits lodged by for-mer chief of the Security Service ofUkraine (SBU) Ihor Smeshko and formerSBU First Deputy Chief VolodymyrSatsiuk. U.S. lawyer Alan Dershowitz is

an advisor to the Kuchma defense team.The criminal case against Mr. Kuchmaregarding his alleged involvement in themurder of journalist Heorhii Gongadzewas opened on March 21. He is chargedwith exceeding his authority and givingunlawful instructions to Internal AffairsMinistry officials, which subsequentlyled to Gongadzes murder. (Interfax-Ukraine)

ANALYSIS


by Pavel Korduban

Eurasia Daily Monitor

Ukraine finds it increasingly difficultto balance its relations between theEuropean Union and Russia, which areviewed in Kyiv as equally importanttrading partners. While talks on politicalassociation and free trade with the EUslowed somewhat recently, Moscow isstepping up its pressure on Ukraine to

join its Customs Union with Kazakhstanand Belarus.

Membership in the Customs Unionand free trade with the EU are mutuallyexclusive. There are signs that Kyivmay opt for the Moscow-led CustomsUnion if the free trade talks with theEU, which started in 2008, are not com-pleted this year as planned.

Moscow uses all methods of persua-sion at its disposal to convince Ukraineto join its trade club. Russian DeputyPrime Minister Igor Shuvalov argued inKyiv in early March that Ukraine wouldbenefit from joining the union and thennegotiating free trade with the EU aspart of it (UNIAN, March 3).

The approach of Russian PrimeMinister Vladimir Putin is less subtle.Speaking in Minsk on March 15, Mr.Putin made it clear that Russia woulduse both carrots and sticks. He saidUkraine would benefit from joining theunion, although he did not explain how.At the same time, he made a specificthreat, saying that if Ukraine opted forfree trade with the EU, Russia wouldbe constrained to build a [trade] bor-der in order to protect its market fromEU goods (Interfax-Ukraine, March 16).

Ukraine is interested in free tradewith Russia, which is the primary mar-ket for key Ukrainian exports. In partic-ular, the local machine-building andfood industries are recovering fast afterthe financial crisis mainly due to grow-ing demand for their products in neigh-boring Russia.

Ukraine also hopes for multibilliondollar loans from Russia to help it buildnew nuclear power uni ts and forRussian orders for its ailing aircraftindustry, which is too weak to competeon the markets outside the CIS.

If Ukraine became part of theCustoms Union, it could hope for

cheaper Russian oil for its refineries anddiscounted natural gas.

Kyiv wants free trade with bothRussia and the EU, but Russia is reluc-tant to open its market to Ukrainiangoods if Ukraine refuses to join theCustoms Union.

Ukraines market is larger than thoseof Russias current union partners,Belarus and Kazakhstan, taken together.Consequently, taking Kyiv onboard isvery important for Moscow.

On March 17, the Ukrainian dailynewspaper Den (The Day) cited ananonymous senior Ukrainian diplomatas saying that Ukraines position on the

Customs Union could change if a freetrade agreement with the EU is not

signed by the end of 2011. The sourceadded that Ukraine could extract a tem-porary benefit from membership in theCustoms Union, although it is unclear inboth capitals what exactly Ukrainewould lose if it opted against joining theunion.

For the time being, Ukraine continuesto prioritize the EU, but this maychange, judging by the mixed signalsfrom Ukrainian officials after Mr.Putins statement in Minsk (Den, March17).

On March 17 Prime Minister MykolaAz a r o v t o l d v i s i t i n g Eu r o p e a nParl iament Social ist group leaderMartin Schultz that Ukraine would con-tinue its free trade talks with the EU,

remaining optimistic about their out-come.Mr. Azarov also expressed regret that

recent discussions of free trade betweenhis first deputy, Andriy Kliuyev and EUofficials in Brussels did not result in abreakthrough. Mr. Azarov suggestedthat the EU should upgrade the formatof the talks in order to strengthen theirmomentum (UNIAN, March 17).

Mr. Azarov went further during ameeting with British businessmen thefollowing day, saying that Ukrainewould apply for EU membership in thefuture (UNIAN, March 18).

However, during an interview withthe Austrian newspaper Der Standard,on March 20, Ukraines prime ministersaid that, although Ukraine continues tohold talks with the EU, this did not nec-essarily mean that Kyiv should abandonthe Customs Union option. He suggest-ed that experts should determine wheth-er membership in the Customs Unionwas worth considering (UkrayinskaPravda, March 21).

Foreign Affairs Minister KostyantynGryshchenko told students in Kyiv thatUkraine wanted to cooperate with theCustoms Union in such a format that theassociation and free trade talks with theEU would not be harmed. He noted thatUkraine was not in talks to join theunion (Interfax-Ukraine, March 18).

At the same time, Mr. Kliuyev told aCIS forum in Moscow that Ukrainemight join the union in the future. He

said Ukraine would participate in eco-nomic unions from which it may bene-fit, such as cooperating on certain tradepositions, while it would be more bene-ficial to be part of a free trade area withthe EU on some other issues (UNIAN,March 18).

Mr. Kliuyev is Ukraines chief nego-tiator in the talks with the EuropeanUnion, and his being evasive may indi-cate a change in Ukraines course.

The article above is reprinted fromEurasia Daily Monitor with permissionfro m it s pu bl is he r, th e Ja me st ow nFoundation, www.jamestown.org.

Ukraine sends mixed signals

on free trade with EU, Russia

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3THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, APRIL 10, 2011No.15

NEWS ANALYSIS

With Kuchma charged in Gongadze case,Ukrainians ask: Is this about murder, or politics?

RFE/RL

Ukraine has a reputation for unre-solved mysteries. Years after the crimes,its still not certain who poisoned ViktorYushchenko, who orchestrated the 2004election fraud that prompted the OrangeRevolution, or perhaps most achingly

who gave the order to kill investigativejournalist Heorhii Gongadze.

The 31-year-old Gongadze was kid-napped and brutally slain in 2000. Sincethen, a popular rendition of the crimescenario has steadily emerged, startingwith the ground-level hit men and travel-ing all the way up the political chain ofcommand to the countrys then-presi-dent, Leonid Kuchma.

But, apart from a handful of policeofficers convicted of carrying out the

actual killing, no one has been tried inthe case. So it was big news when prose-cutors announced on March 24 morethan a decade after the crime that theywere charging Mr. Kuchma in connec-tion with Gongadzes death.

But to many observers, the moveseemed less like due process and morelike political game-playing a notionPresident Viktor Yanukovych tried todismiss last week.

This is all natural. Theres a rumorthat this process is turning political, butthats al l i t is a rumor, Mr.Yanukovych sa id on March 28.Certainly, this is unpleasant for LeonidDanylovych [Kuchma]; no one wouldenvy him in this situation. But its neces-sary to get this over with already.

Melnychenko factor

Its uncertain, however, that theKuchma charges will bring a definitiveend to the Gongadze affair. The back-bone of the prosecutions case rests onhundreds of hours of digital recordingsmade secretly by a member of Kuchmassecurity staff, Mykola Melnychenko.

The Melnychenko tapes purport tocapture Kuchma talking about Gongadze

one of the for mer presid ent s mos tdogged critics and ordering subordi-na tes to dea l wi th h im. Mr .Melnychenko went public with therecordings in late 2000; an Americanforensic company, Bek Tek, later con-cluded the tapes were authentic and thatthe voices included those of Mr.Kuchma.

Mr. Kuchma has denied any involve-ment in Gongadzes death. And the for-mer president has so far managed toavoid a bizarre procedural request tosubmit to a simultaneous interrogationwith Mr. Melnychenko while both menare in the same room. Mr. Melnychenkoaccused the former president of playingfor time.

Leonid Kuchma is using every possi-bility to delay a face-to-face meeting[with me], so that he can personallymeet Yanukovych and blackmail him,Mr. Melnychenko said.

Kuchma has some knowledge that hewants to use to blackmail Yanukovych in

order to get him to stop the investiga-tion, an investigation that includes face-to-face meetings. Because of this,Kuchma ignored the warning that inves-tigators gave him on Monday [to attendthe interrogation].

Mr. Kuchma did report for question-ing on April 1, albeit alone, and used theback entrance to the ProcuratorGenerals Office to avoid journalists.

Further fallout from tapes

The Melnychenko tapes have stirredanxiety in many corners of Kyiv, wherethey have the potential to spawn a host ofadditional cases. Numerous officials,including current Prime Minister MykolaAzarov and Parl iament ChairmanVolodymyr Lytvyn, are allegedly impli-cated in the recordings, captured in con-versations revealing a massive web ofcorruption and criminal activities.

Prosecutors have indicated they arenot pursuing charges against Mr. Lytvyn,who as Rada chair holds immunity thatMr. Kuchma doesnt. But many observ-ers including Mr. Melnychenko himself

believe Mr. Lytvyn, who once servedas President Kuchmas chief of staff,played a critical role in the killing.

Political analyst Volodymyr Fesenkosays prosecutors should exercise cautionbefore introducing the tapes as evidence.Lytvyn is the weakest link in this politi-cal and legal chain, he says. He knowsa lot not only about politics a decadeago, but politics today. It would be dan-gerous to make the tapes the main evi-dence against Kuchma. And theres virtu-ally no other evidence. Authorities hereshould proceed very, very carefully.

But many legal experts includingMr. Kuchmas high-profile Americandefense attorney, Alan Dershowitz havechallenged the veracity of the recordingsto begin with. In a statement circulatedby Mr. Kuchmas spokesperson, Mr.Dershowitz said it was relatively easy tochange words on a digital recording tocreate guilty-sounding statements.

Doubts over evidence, witnesses

Part of the uncertainty rests on the factthat Mr. Melnychenko has never offereda credible explanation for why he madethe tapes or presented the recordingdevices he used to make them. ValentynaTelychenko, the lawyer for Gongadzeswidow, Myroslava, says she has doubtsthe recordings will ultimately be intro-duced as evidence.

Whether the court will accept theserecording as valid evidence is an openquestion, Mr. Telychenko says. Theymight say: The good prosecutors pre-sented this invaluable evidence, but thebad court did not accept it. What else canwe do? Melnychenko still has not pro-vided the equipment he used to makethose recordings.

Ms. Telychenko and Ms. Gongadzehave also expressed disappointment thatprosecutors have stopped short of charg-ing Mr. Kuchma with murder. Instead,they have leveled the lesser charge ofabuse of office in giving unlawfulinstructions to Internal Affairs Ministryofficials, which subsequently led toGongadzes killing.

The 10-year statute of limitations onthose charges has already passed. If thecourt were to overrule the statute andthen find Mr. Kuchma guilty, he couldtheoretically spend up to 12 years in pris-on. Such a step would make Mr.

Kuchma, who ruled newly independentUkraine from 1994-2005, one of only afew post-Soviet leaders to answer forcrimes in a part of the world where cor-ruption and government impunity areconsidered commonplace.

The decade-long history of theGongadze case has left several signifi-cant bodies in its wake. In 2005, YuriyKravchenko, who served as internal

Quotable notesIts a fair bet that [Viktor] Yanukovych figured that giving [Leonid]

Kuchma his comeuppance would be an easy way to score some points. Little didhe know that the case will turn out to be a major-league embarrassment for himand his regime. Probably prompted by his son-in-law, the Western-oriented oli-garch and Davos Man, Victor Pinchuk, Kuchma hired star American defenseattorney, Alan Dershowitz of Harvard University, to represent him. The supreme-ly smart and impressively articulate Dershowitz whose right earlobe has a high-er IQ than the entire Ukrainian government will run circles around theYanukovych mugs, asking impossible questions, probing into unflattering cor-ners, and exposing the Ukrainian political elite as a bunch of vindictive, petty,stupid, corrupt and criminal dolts with no experience of genuine rule of law, espe-cially as practiced by one of the worlds toughest lawyers.

Dershowitzs intervention may or may not save Kuchma, but it will surelydamn Yanukovych. Unsurprisingly for an overextended sultan, Yanukovych has once again maneuvered himself into a cul de sac. If he decides to duck by drop-ping the charges against Kuchma, he will look indecisive and dumb. If he decidesto go ahead with the case, he will look decisive and dumber. Heck, with a littleluck, Dershowitz could succeed in doing what the hapless Ukrainian oppositionhas thus far failed to do bring the Yanukovych regime to its knees. It couldnthappen to a nicer bunch of guys.

Alexander J. Motyl, writing on April 1 on his blog Ukraines OrangeBlues, in an article titled Yanukovych vs. Kuchma and Dershowitz.

Whatever their reasons, the organizers of the Kuchma affair are sophisti-cated, ironic and astute. The announcement that criminal proceedings were beinginstituted, for instance, was made the day before Yulia Tymoshenko went toBrussels. For her Brussels was to be the place where she intended to spill thebeans about the criminal Yanukovych regime and the selective approach of thelaw-enforcement agencies to the opening of criminal cases.

Suddenly the Kuchma case hits the headlines and it immediately underminesall the statements about micromanagement in Ukraine, the infringement of theoppositions rights and the selective approaches.

So the opening of the criminal case is very timely for the authorities.

[Leonid] Kuchma is pleased, because in the end he will be able to prove that heplayed no part in the Gongadze murder. Europe will be pleased: it will sigh andallow itself to relax in the illusion that in Ukraine all is not as black as its paintedby the opposition. [Viktor] Yanukovych will be pleased, because Kuchma andEurope are pleased and because Tymoshenko will be furious at the upsetting ofher plans to tour the European Union telling the truth.

Valery Kalnysh, writing on March 28 on the openDemocracy website in anarticle titled Kevlar Kuchma and the bullet of justice.

affairs minister at the time of the killingand was believed to have given the directorders to kill Gongadze, died after sus-taining two gunshot wounds to the head.The death was ruled a suicide.

In 2009 Gen. Eduard Fere of theInternal Affairs Ministry, who wasbelieved to have served as the intermedi-ary between Mr. Kravchenko andOleksiy Pukach, the police generalwhose three officers carried out the kill-ing, died in a hospital after allegedlyspending the previous six years in acoma. (Mr. Pukach is currently in jailawaiting trial.)

Yuriy Dagayev, a third Internal AffairsMinistry official with ties to the case,also died under suspicious circumstanc-es. The deaths of Kravchenko, Fere andDagayev effectively eliminated the sole

o p p o r t u n i t y t o b a c k u p M r .Melnychenkos tapes with material wit-nesses who could corroborate each oth-ers testimony.

Why reopen the case now?

The sudden frisson in the long-dor-mant case has caused many to wonder:Why now? A Ukrainian civil societygroup, the Democratic InitiativesFoundation, attempted to answer thequestion this week by presenting theresults of a survey of 55 leading politicalscientists and lawyers.

Many of the respondents suggested the

timing of the charges was an attempt torefute accusations from the West that thegovernment is selective in its use of jus-tice. (The charges were leveled the sameday that one of the country most promi-nent politicians, Yulia Tymoshenko, wasin Brussels delivering a speech on selec-tive prosecutions in Ukraine.)

Others said returning to the sensation-al case was meant to distract ordinaryUkrainians from the countrys growingeconomic problems. Still others suggest-ed the Kuchma charges were a good wayto intimidate his powerful son-in-law,billionaire Victor Pinchuk, who controlsseveral of Ukraines most powerful tele-vision channels.

Mr. Yanukovych, who in 2002 wasappointed President Kuchmas primeminister, may now be looking to sever

his ties with his former patron andyanking a few media holdings out of hos-tile hands while hes at it.

Written by Daisy Sindelar, with report-ing by Dmytro Shurkhalo and Dmytro

Barkar in Kyiv.Copyr ight 2011, RFE/RL Inc .

Reprinted with the permission of RadioFree Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201Connecticut Ave. NW, Washington DC20036; www.rferl.org. (See http://www.rferl.org/content/political_questions_about_kuchma_charges_in_gongadze_case/3544174.html.)


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Yulian Gbur,1942-2011

BornDecember4,1942,in thevillage of Bryzhava near Przemysl(Peremyshl), Poland

1947familyresettledtonorthern

Poland during Akcja Wisla ethnocide 1964-1965militaryservice

June1970ordainedapriest

1970-1973 servedas pastorofparish in Krakow

1973-1983 servedas pastorofparish in Gorowo Ilaweckie

1983-1993 servedas pastor ofparish in Pieniezno

June1983appointedvisitatorof Poland and consultant to CardinalStefan Wyszynski

April 1991 appointedchancel-lor of the Przemysl Eparchy

July1994ordained asbishop

by Major Archbishop and CardinalMyroslav Lubachivsky, appointedchancellor of the Lviv Archeparchy

1996-2001 servedas secretaryof the Synod of Bishops

November2000appointedfirstbishop of the Eparchy of Stryi

DiedMarch24,2011

An altar boy carries a portrait of thelate Bishop Yulian Gbur during the

funeral procession.

It was a bittersweet day for the townsfolk one of mourning and celebration asMajor Archbishop Shevchuk returned to thepeople who knew him best as a boy whoplayed the violin and loved the liturgy. Hereturned on March 26 as the leader of theworlds 5.5 million Ukrainian Catholics,and led the faithful in mourning the death ofthe first bishop of the Stryi Eparchy, YulianGbur.

Bishop Gbur, 68, died just two days ear-lier, creating the unique opportunity seem-ingly ordained by God Himself for MajorArchbishop-designate Shevchuk to pay hishometown a half-day homecoming visitbefore departing for Kyiv for his enthrone-ment.

Theres something there, said the Rev.Zynoviy Myklasevych, the major archbish-ops uncle. He could have died earlier, or

later. Yet it was precisely then. Thats alsogiven from the Holy Spirit. Bishop Yuliandied the day after His Beatitude was electedthe new patriarch.

The towns babusi (elderly women)were already buzzing hours before the start

(Continued from page 1)

A bittersweet... of the 9 a.m. divine liturgy, asking eachother whether theyd be attending. Themorning began with a chilly wind, whichwas joined by drizzle by the liturgys con-clusion, which turned to snow once thefuneral was over and everyone had gonehome. It was as if winter was not yet readyto give way to spring, releasing its last gustsof wind and dumping its last remainingstockpiles of snow before the transitioncould take place.

Its become standard practice in thetowns and cities of Halychyna for churchesto broadcast the divine liturgy on speakersso that all passers-by could hear.

It was no different for this exceptionalceremony, which brought UkrainianCatholic bishops from throughout the worldto Stryi, as well as a Polish delegation ofmore than 50 friends and admirers ofBishop Gbur who traveled for as many as10 hours by bus to be present.

About 28 bishops who had just spent aweek at the Churchs recreation center com-plex in the village of Briukhovychi formed an air-tight half circle around thealtar for the funeral service at theAssumption of the Virgin Mary Church,nestled in the city center.

Their cordon was padded by local priests

and buttressed by an army of steel-shoul-dered babusi, intent on getting a glimpse oftheir new Church leadership, as well as for-tifying the protective semicircle from peskyintruders, such as photographers and curiousgawkers.

The divine liturgy was led by ArchbishopIhor Vozniak of the Lviv Archeparchy,while the homily was delivered byArchbishop Ivan Martyniak, metropolitanof the Przemysl-Warsaw Eparchy in whichBishop Gbur was born and raised, and spentthe first half of his service to the Church.

The homily was truly a eulogy, which heled with the famous verse, Any deathdiminishes me, because I am involved inmankind. And therefore never send forwhom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

The archbishop cited Ernest Hemingwayas its source, yet the author had merely bor-rowed the phrase for the title of one of hismost famous books. Indeed the words werepenned by the 17th century English poetJohn Donne.

Archbishop Martyniak described BishopGbur as a priest who spent his whole lifestruggling on behalf of the Ukrainian peo-ple. He was born into a very, very patrioticUkrainian family, devoted to Ukraines free-dom.

The Gburs became victims of PolandsAkcja Wisla ethnocide of Ukrainians in1947 and were resettled from their village ofBerezhava in the Przemysl (Peremyshl)region to the Warmia-Masuria Province innorthern Poland, near the border withKaliningrad, along with thousands of otherUkrainians.

Yulian Gbur joined a Roman Catholicmonastic order, Societas Verbi Divini,before his ordination in the UkrainianCatholic Church in 1970. Assigned toKrakow, he spent three years travelingthroughout Lemkivschyna, serving the spiri-tual needs of the Ukrainian Catholics whoremained there after Akcja Wisla.

He was then dispatched to Gorowo

Ilaweckie, a Ukrainian hub in northernPoland, where he served the community fornearly two decades. He was pastor of thechurches in Gorowo Ilaweckie andPieniezno.

First he built the stone churches thefirst, then the second and third so that thefaithful could rebuild spirituality withinthemselves, Archbishop Martyniak said.Very often I saw how he scraped andwashed the walls because he got an old,

ruined Protestant church. And he renovatedthem.That gave him the needed experience to

help restore St. George Cathedral in Lviv,upon his appointment as chancellor of theLviv Archeparchy in July 1994. He did thissuccessfully, Archbishop Martyniak said,restoring its historical value, and was subse-quently assigned to lead the Stryi Eparchywhen it was established in 2000.

The episcopal mirtes are lined with silkon the interior, and exterior as well, thearchbishop said, but Bishop Gburs mirtewas lined with thorns. He underwent a pain-ful path, with much patience and suffering,from his own and from others. What heendured from his own people hurt bitterly.Each of us feels pain when suffering fromones own.

All his visits, all his buildings howmuch he did from nothing! ArchbishopMartyniak continued. You have a wonder-ful chancellery, an episcopal home. He livedthere and drove several dozen kilometers toStryi. Its for you, because hes not taking itwith him. Hes asking for prayers today, andthey are going with him, because salvationdepends on Gods love and our prayers.

At the liturgys conclusion, prayers andeulogies were offered by Major ArchbishopShevchuk; his successor Bishop TarasSenkiv of the Stryi Eparchy; RomanCatholic Bishop Jerzy Mazur, also a mem-ber of the Verbi Divini Order; and MironSycz, a deputy in the Polish Sejm who grewup with the Rev. Gbur.

Major Archbishop Shevchuk thanked the

Gbur family for giving the Church such afaithful priest. He pointed out the late bish-ops contributions to the Ukrainian Catholiccommunity in Przemysl during his servicethere in the early 1990s.

At the enthronement of Bishop Yulianin the Stryi Eparchy, Bishop Ivan [Vozniak]spoke of how the Przemysl Eparchy gavebirth to three others on the territory of thelongstanding Przemysl eparchy, he said.We see today that it also gave birth to sucha great man, which this [Stryi] eparchycould truly attest to. Now he lies in its foun-dation as a cornerstone.

Bishop Mazur, who spoke in Polish,thanked Bishop Gbur for offering supportfor his work in Siberia between 1998 and2003, even flying to Novosibirsk for theceremony enthroning him as a bishop.

Mr. Sich, an ethnic Ukrainian whosefamily also was transplanted during AkcjaWisla, informed the hundreds gathered thathis Polish delegation had traveled from asfar as the Warmia-Masuria Province nearKaliningrad to honor their priest. BishopGbur defended Ukrainian interests in a post-war Poland that was growing more toleranttowards Ukrainians, yet the latent hostilitystill flared.

Thank you, father. Thank you, father,because you werent only a priest, but itwas you who led the intelligentsia, it wasyou who reminded us that we need to notonly listen, but understand, Mr. Sichsaid. It was you who pushed us to createa separate high school of Ukrainian lan-guage instruction. Its thanks to thisdetermination that we can say today thatwere fulfilling all your goals.

As he spoke, some withdrew handker-

chiefs from their jackets and wiped awaytears that were inspired by the admiringwords.

The crowd had swelled and the churchwas packed by the time Bishop Gburscasket was carried out of the church.

The funeral procession began withseveral rounds around the church, afterwhich mourners walked more than threekilometers to the citys cemetery, where aplot was prepared adjacent to anunmarked grave for soldiers of theUkrainian Insurgent Army (UPA).

By this time, the bishops had alreadydeparted for Kyiv for the next daysenthronement ceremony.

Only Bishop Senkiv the successor toBishop Gbur at the Stryi Eparchy stayed behind to oversee the procession,

at its very center in front of the casket.Cars and buses stopped to allow the

procession to pass, while passengerslooked on in curiosity. Rows of pedestri-ans lined the path some well aware ofthe historic events, most others just learn-ing of the bishops death.

The procession passed AwakenersSquare in Stryi, where there is a memori-al devoted to Notable Natives ofStryischyna, all of whom were born inthe 19th century and are little knownbeyond the region.

Now Stryi has a native of internationalsignificance the new leader of theUkrainian Greek-Catholic Church.

After completing the funeral ceremo-ny, Bishop Senkiv declared, There will

be many to follow, but he was the first.It was his way of honoring the bishopwho laid the foundation the structures,the parishes and the faith for a neweparchy in Ukraine.

Indeed the paths of Major ArchbishopShevchuk and Bishop Gbur had crossedon another important day.

Sviatoslav Shevchuk was to beordained as a priest on June 26, 1994, atSt. George Cathedral in Lviv. Before theceremony, he suggested to his uncle, theRev. Myklasevych, that he lead one finaldivine liturgy as a deacon. Lets do it,his uncle said.

Afterwards Bishop Gbur approachedthem, asking, Who are you? What areyou doing? After explaining, they askedhim, And who are you?

I am the newly nominated BishopYulian, he said. The Rev. Shevchuk wasordained that day in Bishop Gburs pres-ence, who in turn was ordained as a bish-op just a few weeks later.

And thats how we got to know thebishop, whom we buried today, the Rev.Myklasevych said. He was at HisBeatitudes ordination ceremony. Theressomething there.

Hundreds of Ukrainian Catholic faithful in Stryi participate in the funeral procession on March 26 to honor Bishop JulianGbur, the first bishop of the Stryi Eparchy, who died on March 24.

Zenon Zawada


5/24


OBITUARIES

KYIV Mykhailyna Kotsiubynska,literary critic, translator, philologist andone of the Shestydesiatnyky (activists ofthe 1960s), died on January 7. She was79.

Ms. Kotsiubynska was born onDecember 18, 1931, in Vinnytsia,Ukraine. She was a niece of the greatUkrainian writer Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky.

It was the 20th Congress of theCommunist Party of the Soviet Unionand Nikita Khrushchevs denunciation ofJoseph Stalin that opened her eyes to thereality of the Soviet myth. She drew closeto Yevhen Sverstiuk, Ivan Svitlychny andother Shestydesiatnyky active in theKliub Tvorchoyi Molodi (Club ofCreative Youth).

Ms. Kotsiubynskas first public act ofopposition was to add her voice to theprotest against the mass arrests of mem-

bers of the Ukrainian intelligentsia in1965 expressed during the preview show-ing of Serhii Paradzhanovs film TiniZabutykh Predkiv (Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors) in September 1965.

She was thrown out of the CommunistParty as a result and moved to anotherdepartment of the Institute of UkrainianLiterature at the Academy of Sciences ofthe Ukrainian SSR. Even her articlesabout the works of Taras Shevchenkocould not be published. Finally, in 1968,she was dismissed from her position atthe institute.

In 1972, during the second wave ofarrests of Ukrainian rights activists, shewas regularly called in for questioning bythe KGB, and was subjected to searches

and confiscation of materials intended forpublication.

Ms. Kotsiubynska did not consider her-self a dissident, seeing the latter as think-ing in a political manner. In her case, shehad resisted the regime prompted by ethi-cal criteria and her art. She did, however,take part in protests, signed petitions andkept in touch with friends who had beenimprisoned, all of this being fraught withdanger during Soviet times.

She returned to literary scholarship inthe late 1980s and her monographEtudes about Shevchenkos Poetic Art,which was completed in 1967, was finallypublished in 1989. She was a laureate ofthe Vasyl Stus Prize, the National TarasShevchenko Literary Award and others.

Mykhailyna Kotsiubynska, 79,literary scholar, rights activist

LVIV Ivan Hel, a Ukrainian h umanr ight s ac t iv i s t and head of theCommittee for the Defense of theRights of Believers and the Church thatworked for the legalization of theUkrainian Greek-Catholic Church,which had been banned in the SovietUnion, passed away on March 16 inLviv. He was 74.

A Ukrainian human rights activist,dissident politician and journalist, Mr.Hel was born on July 17, 1937, in thevillage of Klitsko, Lviv region ofUkraine. During the Soviet period, hewas repeatedly convicted of so-calledanti-Soviet agitation and propaganda.He spent 16 years in prison and fiveyears in exile.

Mr. Hels father was a veteran of theUkrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), andlater the chairperson of the cultural and

educa t iona l assoc ia t ion Prosvi t a(Enlightenment) in his village. He wassentenced to 20 years in 1950 for help-ing the Organization of UkrainianNationalists.

Young Ivans first encounter withthe Soviet authorities was at the age of13 when, during the arrest of his father,officers of the secret police beat upboth his mother and then Ivan, when hetried to protect his parents.

Mr. Hels first conscious act of civicdisobedience was his public refusal to

join the Komsomol, for which in 1952he was expelled from school after com-pleting the first term of his 10th (final)grade. After finishing night school, heattempted to apply to Lviv University,

however his application papers werenot accepted on the grounds that hewas the son of a Bandera supporter. Hefound himself a job as a mechanic at aLviv factory for loading vehicles.

In 1961, on the 100th anniversary ofthe death of the great poet TarasShevchenko, Mr. Hel and a friend laida crown of thorns at the Shevchenkomonument in Kyiv. It was at that timethat he met Mykhailo Horyn, who wasa l r e a d y i n c o n t a c t w i t h I v a nSvitlychny, Ivan Dzyuba, YevhenSverstiuk, Vasyl Symonenko and otherrights activists of the 1960s. Mr. Helthen began preparing and distributingsamvydav materials.

On August 25, 1965, Mr. Hel wasarrested together with other Ukrainiandissidents. He was sentenced on March25, 1966, by the Lviv Regional Courtunder Articles 62 (anti-Soviet agita-tion and propaganda) and 64 of theCriminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR tothree years harsh regime labor campfor distributing Ukrainian samvydavand for organizational activity.

He served his sentence in 1966-1968in the political labor camps of theMordovian ASSR, where he met manyrepresentat ives of the democrat icmovement in the USSR. In 1967 hewrote letters on two occasions to thePresidium of the Verkhovna Rada ofthe Ukrainian SSR defending theUkrainian Greek-Catholic Church anddemanding the abolition of Article 62.

Following his release, Mr. Hel wasnot allowed to return to his studies atthe university or to reside in Lviv. Helived in the town of Sambir in the Lvivregion.

He was published in the samvydavand distributed 11 books, among themSered Snihiv (Amid the Snows) byValentyn Moroz and Mr. DzyubasInternationalism or Russification?

Ivan Hel, 74, human rights activist,

Ukrainian Catholic Church advocate

Ivan Hel in an undated photo.Mykhailyna Kotsiubynska in a 1992photo.

In 1992 she spent three months as avisiting scholar at the Canadian Instituteof Ukrainian Studies, University ofAlberta. She participated in seminars,advised graduates students and workedclosely with the professors of theDepartment of Slavic and East EuropeanStudies. She also lectured about theUkrainian dissident writers of the 1960sand about Ukrainian women in poetryand politics.

She headed the literary group that in1999 published a multi-volume collection

of the works of Vasyl Stus (who died in aSoviet labor camp in 1985). Most recent-ly she was working on a 10-volume col-lection of works by the late VyacheslavChornovil, former Soviet political prison-er and leader of Rukh, the PopularMovement of Ukraine

Ms. Kotsiubynska was a co-founder ofthe Ukrainian branch of the InternationalPEN Club. She was a member of theUkrainian Writers Union since 1989. In2008 she was inaugurated as an honoraryprofessor at the National University ofKyiv Mohyla Academy.

Sources: Kharkiv Human RightsProtection Group, Radio Liberty, TheUkrainian Weekly.

In November 1970 Mr. Hel sent aletter of protest to the Supreme Courtof the Ukrainian SSR in connectionwith the sentence handed down to Mr.Moroz. On December 7 of that year hespoke at the funeral of Alla Horska,calling the murdered artist a faithfuldaughter of the Ukrainian renaissanceof the 1960s and comparing her fatewith that of her people. In retaliation,he was issued a severe reprimand foralleged unexplained absences fromwork.

Mr. Hel was arrested on January 12,1972, and in August was sentenced to10 years special regime labor campand five years exile.

He served the camp sentence both inthe Mordovian and the Perm politicallabor camps, and the period of exile inthe village settlement of Mylva in theKomi Autonomous Soviet Republic.

He returned from exile to Ukraineon January 17, 1987, during the periodof perestroika. From 1988 he played anactive role in public life as leader ofthe Committee for the Defense of theRights of Believers and the Church(also known as the Committee toProtect the Rights of the UkrainianCatholic Church) and editor of the

journa l Khrystiyansky Holos (Chris tianVoice). He was involved in the creationof the organization Memorial and thePo p u l a r M o v e m e n t o f Uk r a i n e(Narodnyi Rukh Ukrainy) and becamea member of the editorial board of therevived journal Ukrainian Herald.

The most notable events in the cam-paign for the legal izat ion of theUkrainian Greek-Catholic Church,which had been functioning under-ground for 40 years, took place onSeptember 17, 1989, in Lviv, whenmore than 300,000 people gathered,and the five-month hunger strike byclergy and faithful in Moscow on theArbat.

After the collapse of the Soviet

Union, Mr. Hel was an active politi-c ian . In 2009 Pres ident ViktorYushchenko awarded him the Order ofLiberty for significant contributions tothe revival of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church.

Sources: Rel igious Information

Service of Ukraine, Kharkiv Human

Rights Protection Group.


6/24


Eleven years ago, on April 16, 2000, 79 percent of Ukrainesvoters supported four questions put to them in a national refer-endum, with more than 80 percent voting in the affirmative toeach of the proposals.

The vote was supposed to force lawmakers to amend theConstitution of Ukraine to broadly restructure the Parliament. Eighty-two percent votedin support of the creation of a bicameral Parliament, 90 percent supported the reductionfrom 450 to 300 the number of national deputies in Parliament, 89 percent said they sup-ported limits on lawmakers immunity from prosecution, and 85 percent voted to extendto the president the right to dismiss the Verkhovna Rada, should it fail to develop a par-liamentary majority or fail to approve a national budget within a month.

In the voting breakdown by region, three western oblasts, Zakarpattia, Ivano-Frankivsk

and Ternopil, supported three of the four proposals by more than 95 percent each. And forthe creation of the a bicameral Parliament, 90 percent of those residents voted yes.The lowest support for the measures came from Sevastopol in Crimea, But the

Zaporizhia, Kherson and Poltava oblasts showed at least 60 percent of voters voicedapproval for each of the four proposals.

Experts believed the petition-gathering that led to Leonid Kuchmas presidential orderwas not a spontaneous outburst of civic responsibility, but an organized endeavor by peo-ple close to the presidential administration who hoped to bring the unwieldy VerkhovnaRada under control through popular vote. Officially, nearly 4 million voters signed peti-tions calling for a national referendum, which was certified by the Central ElectionCommission.

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), invited by membersof the Verkhovna Rada, had sent a monitoring committee to determine whether the refer-endum met European standards. The committee condemned the vote as unconstitutionaland threatened Ukraine with sanctions.

President Kuchma responded by accusing PACE of interfering in the internal affairs ofa sovereign country. However, he assured Europe that Ukraine would abide by the deci-sion of its Constitutional Court, which was still deliberating the issue.

The court ruled that the referendum was not consultative, and that the results must beimplemented and enforced.

The decision of April 16 had a political, not a legal character, explained VerkhovnaRada First Vice-Chairman Viktor Medvedchuk. The answer yes did not create any-thing. Lawmakers needed to pass between 32 and 40 laws to lay the groundwork for theconstitutional amendments to be effective. Also adding difficulty to the implementationof the referendum results, two-thirds of the lawmakers had to support the separateamendments as finally written.

Source: Ukrainians resoundingly approve all four referendum proposals, by Roman

Woronowycz, The Ukrainian Weekly, April 23, 2000.

April

162000

Turning the pages back...

Looking around at our community here in North America, we often try to find thegood news, the special institutions among us that make a difference and deserve tobe spotlighted. And we found a gem in Cleveland: the Ukrainian Museum-Archives.

Its mission is both straightforward and noble: To preserve and share Ukrainianculture and the immigrant experience. Founded back in 1952 which means thatnext year will be this exemplary institutions 60th anniversary the ClevelandMuseum-Archives today is a modern facility that continues to expand its offerings tothe great benefit of the surrounding community. Both Ukrainians and non-Ukrainianshave gained immeasurably from the work of the UMA in the greater Cleveland area.

That this is so can be seen in the fact that the institution has received multiplegrants from both Ukrainian and non-Ukrainian entities, most recently from theCity of Cleveland, Cuyahoga Arts and Culture, Ohio Humanities Council,Ukrainian Heritage Foundation and the Antonovych Foundation.

According to its 2010 annual report, the UMA today has six rooms of perma-nent exhibits that encompass Ukrainian folk art, Ukrainian history and the fourwaves of Ukrainian immigration to the United States beginning with the 19thcentury. In addition, the museum recently sponsored art exhibits by up-and-com-ing as well as established artists, and special exhibitions dedicated to the 60thanniversaries of Plast Ukrainian Scouting Organization and the UkrainianAmerican Youth Association. UMA personnel are involved also in preparing off-site exhibits in the Cleveland area, and the UMA works with other institutions,such as The Ukrainian Museum and the Ukrainian Institute of America, both inNew York, in sharing artifacts for their shows.

For 2011, the Ukrainian Museum Archives has already announced a nine-dayEaster Bazaar (its 18th annual), classes in one of the most popular of Ukrainianfolks arts (pysanka-making), an exhibit of unique textiles from the HnatiukCollection of Ukrainian Folk Art, a special exhibit of maps, as well as a varietyof lectures and workshops. It continues its important Oral History Project, whichaims to capture and preserve memories, stories and life experiences as sharedby members of the Ukrainian American community. (The UMA invites commu-nity members to nominate individuals who have testimonies to share.)

In todays financial environment, the Ukrainian Museum Archives is con-cerned that previous sources of funding such as government grants will beunavailable and that charitable foundations also have less funds to grant. Theresult, of course, would be that this fine institutions work could be adverselyaffected. Therefore, the UMA has announced that among its financial goals for2011 is increasing membership and looking for new sources of funding frommore foundations. We encourage our readers to consider a nominal membershipin the UMA or a larger donation to help support this true gem. (To find out more,we direct readers to www.umacleveland.org.)

A gem in Cleveland

The UkrainianWeeklyCOMMENTARY

by Mykola Riabchuk

On February 25, on the first anniversa-ry of his presidency, Viktor Yanukovych

invited his three predecessors to his officeto discuss current issues and the futuredevelopment of the Ukrainian state( h t t p : / / w w w . p r e s i d e n t . g o v . u a /news/19454.html). This brief item ofinformation on the presidents officialwebsite was illustrated with a photo of thesmiling participants at the meeting Viktor Yushchenko on the left, LeonidKravchuk on the right, and Mr. Kuchmaacross the round table from the incum-bent.

None of them, with the exception prob-ably of the host, realized that behind itscheerful faade, the meeting resembledone of those Byzantine banquets thatwould end with the poisoning, slaughter-ing or impaling of the distinguished

guests.A month later, one of the participantsof the meeting, ex-president LeonidKuchma, may understand that metaphor.On March 24 he was summoned for inter-rogation to the Procurators GeneralsOffice, charged with the abuse of powerand implicated in the killing of investiga-tive journalist Heorhii Gongadze back inSeptember 2000.

In President Yanukovychs Ukraine,where the judiciary is just a part of theexecutive, fully subordinated to the presi-dent, and where the procurator general ishis bosom buddy (a member of the presi-dents team, as he characterized himselfproudly in public), hardly anyonebelieves that the case against Mr. Kuchmawas launched without the direct blessingof Mr. Yanukovych.

Speculation revolves mostly aroundthe question of why Mr. Yanukovych hastaken this dubious step and what conse-quences may follow. The alleged reasonstypically include Mr. Yanukovychsdesire to divert public attention from hisdomestic and international failures, todisprove accusations against his govern-ment about selective justice, and tointimidate opponents and mobilize sup-porters by proving that the president istough but just.

Yulia Mostova highlights another rea-son why Mr. Yanukovych might want toprosecute Mr. Kuchma: revenge for theperceived humiliation during the OrangeRevolution, when the incumbent refusedto use force against the protesters andpass on the office to the president-elect,opting instead for negotiation and com-promise that ended up with the repeatedsecond round of the election and Mr.Yanukovychs defeat. If the price ofbecoming the pick-up successor toLeonid Kuchma was 400 million thanks,as Mostova implies, the reasons forrevenge might be even more serioushttp://www.dt.ua/articles/78263.

Remarkably, not a single expert orcommentator expressed the opinion thatMr. Yanukovych was driven in his deci-sion by some idealistic desire for justiceor the practical need for housecleaning.In view of all of Mr. Yanukovychs otherdeeds, it is really difficult to sell such a

nice story to anyone either at home orabroad. This does not preclude, however,a smart usage of all these arguments bys o m e p e o p l e a r o u n d P r e s i d e n tYanukovych to persuade him to launchthe case against Mr. Kuchma. This mightwell be in the interests of these people,but it is hardly in the interests of Mr.Yanukovych himself for the followingreasons.

First, the propaganda effect of thisstep, in terms of positive image-buildingfor Mr. Yanukovych, is negligible. No oneconsiders it an act of justice and proof of

the equality of all Ukrainian citizensbefore the law. All the policies ofUkrainian authorities suggest the oppositefrom all regions and walks of life everyday and every hour.

Second, Mr. Kuchma can hardly besentenced by any court, however execu-tive they are in Ukraine, because all thepeople to whom he may have given adirect order (or suggestion) to killGongadze are dead and would not be ableto testify. And the recordings presumablysecretly made by Mr. Kuchmas guardMykola Melnychenko, even if acceptedas evidence (that itself is very problemat-ic), do not contain any direct order tocarry out murder.

Third and most important, by initiating

the trial, Mr. Yanukovych very unwiselydraws public attention to his own conver-sations with Mr. Kuchma recorded by Mr.Melnychenko, which are not just deplor-able but definitely merit a criminal inves-tigation (intimidation of judges, black-mail, bribery, large-scale corruption, etc).Deputy Procurator General RenatK u z m i n , w h o m e n t i o n e d M r .Melnychenkos records among the possi-ble evidence against Mr. Kuchma, hasinadvertently opened a Pandoras box,since this very evidence could be usedagainst dozens of Ukrainian officials whodiscussed a variety of criminal plans withMr. Kuchma. (Almost all are alive andwell, and now follow their new master,Mr. Yanukovych).

There is little surprise that oppositionNational Deputy Yuri Hrymchak hasalready submitted an official request tothe procurator general demanding aninvestigation of many more episodesrecorded by Mr. Melnychenko that testifyto criminal conspiracy and activity ofother members of the Kuchma team,including current Prime Minister MykolaAzarov and Mr. Yanukovych himself( h t t p : / / w w w . p r a v d a . c o m . u a /news/2011/03/25/6054029/.)

And, finally, Mr. Yanukovych appar-ently has created the precedent of prose-cuting ex-presidents that may eventuallybe applied against him (at least as a toolof psychological pressure and possibleblackmail) (ht tp: / /www.dt .ua/art i -cles/78776.)

So, if the case does not reliably serveMr. Yanukovychs personal interests andif the public interests are not, in principle,his concern, the question arises: Who ismost likely to benefit from the dubiousspecial operation and how?

Dr. Andrij Zhalko-Tytarenko, formerhead of the Ukrainian Space Agency andthe former director of the Science andTechnology Center of Ukraine in Kyiv,considers the entire Melnychenko affair(or Kuchmagate) a provocation by theRussian secret services aimed at estab-lishing full control over PresidentKuchma. The theory is hardly new, sincemany experts have argued that Mr.Kuchma had no real reasons to physicallydestroy Gongadze and that he was merely

framed by some powerful and influentialenemies seeking to compromise him.The only weak element in this theory is

the involvement of the leading Ukrainianpolice officers, including the late Ministerof Internal Affairs Yurii Kravchenko, inGongadzes abduction and killing. Nonewould have dared to play into Russianhands without a blessing from above if

Pandoras Box and the Moscow Orchestra



7/24


Lately, issues of importance to theUkrainian Canadian community havebeen in the fore. Some show progress;others call for greater diligence.

Given that late spring national elec-tions were a possibility, the UkrainianCanadian Congress postponed the tributedinner to Prime Minister Stephen Harperas it did not wish to politicize the event.

Canadas prime minister was selectedfor the prestigious Taras Shevchenkomedal for his contribution in recognizingthe Holodomor as a genocide against theUkrainian people, reconciliation forCanadas First National InternmentOperations (1914-1920) which effectedthousands of Ukrainian Canadians, forenhancing Canada-Ukraine relations, and

supporting democracy and human rightsin Ukraine.

The award is well-justified. However,all politicians are presently seeking votesand having a major event for a leadingcandidate was not good news for theLiberals and New Democrats who alsoseek our community members support atthe polls.

Mr. Harpers Conservative Party hasworked hard with ethnic communitiesdisdainful of Communisms dictatorialpast in their homelands. He was promi-nent in paying tribute to the fall of theBerlin Wall. The Tribute to Liberty monu-ment, dedicated to the victims ofCommunist atrocities, found a prestigiouslocation in the nations capital despite ini-

tial bureaucratic bumbling. His perfor-mance in Ukraine especially given itsown government hostile to human rights

gained international applause.The spoiler in good feelings towards

the Harper government is its crown cor-poration (i.e., a corporation established bythe federal government as an instrumentof public policy), the Canadian Museumfor Human Rights (CMHR), which isconsidering a wrongful treatment of theFamine-Genocide of some 10 millionUkrainians by the Kremlin. Other groupslike the East European Council, theGermans and Armenians have protested,while the latest polls indicate Canadiansdo not approve of this discrimination.

The controversy had put a pall on theprime ministers award. It is possible thatactivists might have used the event to fur-ther embarrass the government. The post-ponement suits the other parties. TheLiberal Partys point man for the ethniccommunities, the very popular UkrainianCanadian Boris Wrzesnewskyj, producedsome 15 signatures from his party sup-porting the Holodomors equitable treat-ment at the CMHR. As the pressuremounts and elections approach, expectmore support.

Not since the Royal Commission onBilingualism (B & B) and Biculturalismin the 1960s has the Ukrainian Canadiancommunity had an issue of such national,indeed global, significance. The recogni-tion of Ukraine was not as touchy. Thequestioning of the B&Bs approach to

defining Canada led by a prominentUkrainian Canadian board member Dr.Yaroslav Rudnyckyj gave birth toCanadas multicultural policy a first inthe world.

An equal or comparative treatment ofthe Holodomor with the Holocaust couldbe another Canada-led first.

The singling out of the Holocaust ashas engaged the sensi t ivi t ies of

Canadians, including Roger W. SmithChair, International Institute for Genocideand Human Rights Studies, who wrote:

The prominence given the Holocaustwith its own separate gallery, and the asyet unclear status of the other cases ofMass Atrocity is causing considerableconcern within some communities.

There is a further benefit, not to sayan imperative, to the comparativeapproach. By exploring genocide in acomparative manner, we can begin to seeits patterns. When we see and understandthose patterns, we have the ability to pre-dict the conditions by which genocidemay occur. Once we have the ability topredict when genocide may occur, then

we have the possibility of preventing it.He recommends that the CMHR

convey, as part of the universal experi-ence, the historical, political and morallessons of genocide in an inclusive, holis-tic and comparative manner. Anythingless would do a grave disservice to itsstated mission and would become of con-cern to the conscience of all Canadians.

The museum can still do the rightthing. Its Content Advisory Committee which recommended the museums cur-rent approach is not the decision-mak-ing body. Hopefully, the museum took astep in that direction by appointing ay o u n g d e c i s i o n - m a k e r , L i n d yLedohowski, Ph.D., to its board of trust-ees. The announcement refers to her as awriter, English teacher at the Universityof Waterloo, a communications consultantand an active member of severalCanadian professional associations.Neither involvement with the subject athand nor with the Ukrainian communityare listed.

Four other board appointments expireafter August 2011; a fifth is alreadyvacant. The UCC needs a compelling listof nominees to ensure a positive outcomefor the Holodomors treatment at theCMHR.

Now, for an issue that should havebeen settled some 20 years ago.

Over the years it has been pointed outthat Canadas contract specification for

federally funded work in Ukraine oftencalls for Russian or Ukrainian languagerequirements. As the language issue isvery controversial in Ukraine, Canadasgovernment should respect Ukrainesofficial language policy.

Heres a case in point: The EuropeanB a n k f o r R e c o n s t r u c t i o n a n dDevelopment has created a new website.Chernobyl25 (chernobyltwentyfive.org)is offered only in English and Russian.This is inappropriate and must stop.

The Ukrainian World Congress (UWC)might take up this issue. Its members arecitizens of countries that ultimately footthe bill Canadas some 34.9; the US183; and Europe 250 million Euros forthis project alone.

Ensuring that Ukraines attributes ofnationhood are treated with respect byinternational institutions is as importantas having the UWC lobby the govern-ment of Ukraine on its official languageissue.

Ukrainian issues in Canada

From a Canadian Angleby Oksana Bashuk Hepburn

Oksana Bashuk Hepburn may be con-tacted at [email protected].

NEWS AND VIEWS

by Lubomyr Luciuk

Its Canadas first national museumoutside the capital region. Thats fine.

Its at The Forks, in Winnipeg. Great.

Its called the Canadian Museum forHuman Rights (CHMR).

Alas, its not actually that. Instead itsshaping up as a museum focused on theShoah, Jewish suffering in World War II.

If this were a privately funded projectthat would be fine. But, since March 13,2008, the CMHR has become a nationalinstitution funded from the public purse.Already over-budget, and having failed tosecure its projected donations, its ongo-ing operating costs will be borne by thosewho pay taxes. As that includes me, Ireckon I have a stake in what this muse-um is all about. As you can probablyguess Im out of sorts, possibly becauseIm sure Ive been had.

Like many, I took Israel Asper at his

word when he claimed, May 29, 2003:This museum will be totally apoliticaland antiseptic in terms of trying to preacha message of one kind of inhumanityover another. I also reckoned that hisdaughter, Gail, and the executive directorof The Asper Foundation, Moe Levy,meant it as they rebroadcast that soothingmessage. For example, on January 9,2004, in The Winnipeg Free Press, theyaffirmed the CMHR would not promoteany hierarchy of suffering. Nor, theyclaimed, would any community beasked to contribute any specific amountin order to tell their story since profes-sionals working in close consultationwith all of the groups whose stories willbe told, would be responsible for themuseums contents. Furthermore those

planners had inclusiveness mandated astheir guiding principle.

So when, on March 31, 2008, theMinisterial Advisory Committee headedby Winnipegs own Arni Thorsteinsontabled its report with Member ofParliament Jose Verner, then minister ofCanadian heritage, I swallowed the pab-lum, mollified by Table 7 which detailedhow Canadians rank-ordered the subjectsthey wanted addressed, as follows:

Aboriginal (First Nations), 16.1 percentGenocides, 14.8 percentWomen 14.7 percentInternments, 12.5 percentWar and conflicts, 8.7 percentHolocaust, 7 percent

Children, 5.9 percentSexual orientation, 4.9 percentEthnic minorities, 3.8 percent

Slavery, 2.9 percentImmigration, 2.6 percentCharter of Rights, 2.3 percentDisabilities, 2 percentUniversal Declaration of Human

Rights, 1.8 percent

That was a very reasonable list, moreor less ordered as Id rank themes rele-vant for inclusion in any human rightsmuseum, anywhere. Youd think theCMHRs trustees would honor thisinstruction. They didnt. They probablyalways had a different agenda.

Evidence for that can be found inanother final report, of the CMHRsContent Advisory Committee, submittedMay 25, 2010. From sixth spot theHolocaust somehow got pushed up thelist to pride of place, with its own privi-leged, permanent and prominent centralgallery. All other genocides and crimesagainst humanity, formerly in the No. 2

spot, were plunged into a mass atroci-ties zone.

Native Canadians may have fared bet-ter. Whether aboriginals were going tohave a gallery originally is not certain butnow they might, although still slippingfrom poll position one to two since theirstories will never get the same play as theShoah. As the Assembly of First Nationshas not uttered a word on the controversyover the CMHRs contents, they musthave been pacified with what they got.

We werent. And we said so, loud andclear.

Finally the other side replied, noneother than Ms. Asper herself, interviewedrecently by Macleans. For her those whochallenged the Asper vision of theCMHR are nothing but an acrimoniousand tiny minority, easily dismissed.Ouch, that hurts.

But is it true?The Ukrainian Canadian Civi l

Liberties Association (UCCLA) andCanadians for a Genocide Education puther conceit to the test. We commissionedNanos Research to include a questionabout the CMHR in a national surveycompleted in mid-March. The resultsshow an overwhelming majority ofCanadians 60.3 percent of women andmen representing all age groups, allregions and all voter profiles agreeingwith our position that the CMHRs 12galleries should be thematic, comparativeand inclusive, that no gallery should ele-vate any communitys suffering above all

others.Whos the minority?Now Ms. Asper was right when she

said the Canadian Museum for HumanRights is Canadas museum. It is. Itsours. Not hers. And Canadians have justtold her and her friends yet again what we want included in our museum.Maybe this time shell listen. But itdoesnt really matter whether she does.Were sure the politicians will hear us.Soon enough.

CMHR and what the public wants

Lubomyr Luciuk, Ph.D., is director ofresearch for the Ukrainian CanadianCivil Liberties Association and a 2010recipient of the Taras Shevchenko Medal.The Nanos Research survey question onthe CMHR and related materials can be

found at www.uccla.ca (under MediaReleases).

Opinions in The Ukrainian Weekly

Opinions expressed by columnists, commen-tators and letter-writers are their own and do

not necessarily reflect the opinions of either

The Weekly editorial staff or its publisher, the

Ukrainian National Association.


8/24


not from Mr. Kuchma, at least from theminister who may have acted (or pretend-ed to act) on Mr. Kuchmas behalf. Hecould probably have done so only with aclear perspective to replace Mr. Kuchmaas president, which seems very unlikelyunder those circumstances.

Dr. Zhalko-Tytarenko hypothesizesthat the current re-launch of the

(Continued from page 6)

Pandoras Box... Gongadze case is part of the Russiandomestic power game. According to histheory, Russian President DmitryMedvedev may be planning to run for asecond term and needs to convince thetwo-time former president, VladimirPutin, not to run. If Mr. Kuchma willface murder charges (it is too late forabuse of power charges), he will have nochoice but to provide all the names thathe certainly knows from UkrainianSecurity Service reports. This may holda certain grain of truth provided that Mr.Melnychenkos records contain, inter alia,

some very unpleasant information for Mr.Putin discovered by the SBU about hisconnections with the notorious SemionMogilevich and involvement in launder-ing drug money through the St.-Petersburg company SPAG (www.ukrai-nianstudies.uottawa.ca/pdf/P_Koshiw_Danyliw07.pdf.)

Dr. Zhalko-Tytarenko might be rightabout Mr. Medvedevs sophistication andeven ambitions but hardly about his realinfluence and use of independent resourc-es to launch such a complicated manipu-lative game.

Rather, the Russian element in the

story is simpler and more traditional. TheKremlin people on Mr. Yanukovychsteam persuaded him to make one moreself-defeating step exactly in the sameway they persuaded him to give ministe-rial posts to Mykhailo Yezhel, DmytroTabachnyk, and Valeriy Khoroshkovsky,to promote the Russian Orthodox Churchin Ukraine at the cost of all other denomi-nations, to suppress the Ukrainian lan-guage, culture and identity, to violate andmanipulate the Constitution, to make aRussian citizen the head of his body-guards, to detain one of Angela Merkelsmen at Kyivs Boryspil airport on the eveof his own official visit to Germany, andto make many more stupid maneuversthat not a single professional politicianwould ever commit. The goal of themanipulators is clear: to underminePresident Yanukovychs authority, tocompromise him both domestically andinternationally, and to render him anotherAlyaksandr Lukashenka, ostracized bythe West and completely dependent onMoscow.

Taras Chornovil, former Yanukovychinsider, defines these people as theMoscow Quartet: Serhiy Liovochkin,Mr. Khoroshkovsky, Dmytro Firtash andYurii Boiko. All are reportedly involvedin murky gas deals with Russia, fully con-trolled by Messrs. Putin and Mogilevichas Gazproms shadow owners. We canhardly obtain proof of these speculationsbut we are likely to see the results of thisand many more special operations car-

ried out by the Moscow Orchestra (rath-er than a humble quartet).

The Kuchma case will not end in theforeseeable future, but will rather be usedto compromise (and probably to black-mail) the entire elite, including Mr.Yanukovych himself. This might be wella part of the strategy of directed chaosthat includes also the creation of fakenationalist and extremist groups,

planting bombs (the explosions at apart-ment blocks in Russia in 1999 that pre-ceded Mr. Putins election provide a fit-ting precedent) and many more (http://www.kyivpost.com/news/opinion/op_ed/detail/100803/.)

Back in 2004, the Moscow politicaltechnologists tried to implement such astrategy in Ukraine to promote the candi-dacy of Mr. Kuchma for a third presiden-tial term. The directed chaos, however,veered out of their control and resulted inan authentic mass uprising, i.e. theOrange Revolution. Remarkably, one ofthe leading Moscow technologists of

that time, Igor Shuvalov, serves today asan adviser to Mr. Lyovochkin and, atthe same time, to the leading UkrainianTV channel Inter owned inevitably by SBU Chief Khoroshkovsky (http://w w w . p r a v d a . c o m . u a / a r t i -cles/2011/04/1/6073286/.)

Besides the clear political goal tostrengthen the authoritarian power of arogue president completely dependent onMoscow the team may pursue a morepractical and palpable goal: to eliminateas many political-cum-economic playersas possible from the forthcoming privati-zation of Ukraines last asset, its arableland. (The protracted moratorium on itssale is expected to be lifted at the appro-priate moment,)

In a recent interview, Mr. Kravchuk, aformer Communist apparatchik and per-haps the smartest of all Ukrainian presi-dents, suggested that: the system hasalready gnawed away Mr. Yanukovychslegs and is approaching his belly. So, hemust either destroy the system or con-centrate all power in his hands andbecome a totalitarian leader (http://www.pravda.com.ua/art icles/2011/04/4/6077221/.) The latter, Mr. Kravchukbelieves, is unlikely because Ukrainianswould not accept it. He may be right, butthe problem is that Mr. Yanukovych is lis-tening not to Ukraines first president, butrather to the Moscow Orchestra.

Mykola Riab chuk is an auth or andjournali st from Ukraine, and a leading

intellectual who is affiliated with thejournal Krytyka.

The article above is reprinted from theblog Current Politics in Ukraine(http://ukraineanalysis.wordpress.com/)created by the Stasiuk Program for theStudy of Contemporary Ukraine, a pro-gram of the Canadian Institute ofUkrainian Studies at the University of

Alberta. It was posted on April 4.

Montreal journalist honored for Ukrainian coverageby Vasyl Pawlowsky

MONTREAL Over 100 invitedleaders of the Ukrainian Canadian com-munity and guests gathered at theMcGill University Faculty Club onMarch 21, to honor Frdrick Lavoie,investigative journalist of La Presse of

Montreal, the fourth recipient of theJohn Syrnick Journalism Award spon-sored by the Ukrainian CanadianFoundation of Taras Shevchenko.

Mr. Lavoie achieved this honor forhis comprehensive coverage of thepolitical situation in Ukraine fromSeptember 2009 to September 2010 ofimportance and relevance to UkrainianCanadians.

The award, comprising a plaque,$ 1 , 0 0 0 a n d t wo c o p i e s o f t h eEncyclopedia of Ukraine one for the

jour nali st and one for his employer was presented by Andrew Hladyshevsky,president of the Shevchenko Foundation.

The chairperson of the NationalSelection Committee was Dr. Christine

Turkewych.

The Syrnick Award for Journalismwas launched in February of 2005 by theboard. It acknowledges the useful, and ifyou will, the inspirational efforts ofCanadian journalists who produceinsightful and substantive reporting ontopics of interest to the Ukrainian

Canadian community, stated Mr.Hladyshevsky in his opening remarks.He went on to explain the relevance of

the award. He noted that the paperUkrainskyi Holos, or Ukrainian Voice, ofwhich Syrnick was editor from 1947 to1970, is over 100 years old and how ithad been banned as a publication by thefederal government from 1914 through1920.

The issue of journalists, and the issueof journalists bringing forward the truthand the truth always ringing out is thereason why we have named this awardfor John Syrnick, Mr. Hladyshevskyadded.

Mr. Lavoie a native of Chicoutimi,Quebec, is a freelance journalist who has Journalist Frederick Lavoie holding the Syrnick Journalism Award (front), with

Andrij Hladyshevsky (second from left), Dr. Christine Turkewych (far right) and

other organizers of the event.(Continued on page 15)

Yurij Luhovy


9/24


Cleveland community revisits Chornobyl 25 years laterby Nadia Deychakiwsky

NORTH ROYALTON, Ohio A som-ber commemoration of the Chornobylnuclear tragedy was held on March 19, inthe Cleveland area. It was hosted byBranch 12 of the Ukrainian NationalWomens League of America (UNWLA)

and was attended by the Ukrainian andnon-Ukrainian public.

The interest in the worlds most seri-ous nuclear power accident was intensi-fied by the tragic events at the FukushimaDaiichi Power Plant in Japan, whichcoincides with the 25th anniversary yearof the accident at Chornobyl.

The Ukrainian Health Ministry nowestimates that 2.4 million Ukrainians suf-fer various health problems due to expo-sure to radiation, including thousands ofthyroid cancers among the youth. Tenpercent of Ukraines land was irradiated,and 164,000 families were relocated fol-lowing the accident.

However, a number of elderly folks mostly women returned to their aban-

doned villages located in the dead zone the 30-kilometer radius exclusion zonesurrounding the Chornobyl nuclear powerplant.

The speaker, writer and filmmakerIrene Zabytko, did not elaborate or con-centrate on the scientific-technologicalaspects or the tragic aftereffects ofChornobyl for the entire nation. After abrief introduction on the political back-

ground especially the irresponsibility ofthe then Soviet leadership the focus ofthe presentation was on the returnedevacuees.

The speaker pondered the questions:How do people cope with cataclysmicevents? How is life possible after such a

devastation? How did they even existphysically after returning to empty, irra-diated homes? What kept them going?What were they thinking?

Ms. Zabytko tries to answer such ques-tions through literature and film, namely,her novel The Sky Unwashed and herdocumentary film Life In the DeadZone, an ongoing endeavor projected tobe finished by the end of this year. (Herupcoming fourth trip to Chornobyl withco-director Peter Mychalewycz and aprofessional film crew will take place thisMay.)

Ms. Zabytko read several excerptsfrom her haunting and beautiful fact-based novel in which she captures theremarkable spiritual strength of these

babusi who simply couldnt do other-wise but return to their beloved thoughirradiated ancestral homes in the fictitiousvillage of Starylis (modeled on the realvillage of Opachychi).

The writer doesnt like to call theseelderly women victims but rather sur-vivors pointing to their phenomenalstrength and incredible tenacity. They donot give up. It doesnt occur to them to

commit suicide or otherwise throw in thetowel. Their answer is: We survivedStalin, the Holodomor, the war, the Nazis

well survive this.The novel poignantly illustrates the

contrast between generations. On the onehand, there are the old folks with their

indispensable customs and traditions,their rural way of life, religious faith andhigh moral standards. On the other hand,there is the young technological/indus-trialized generation with a less thandesirable set of values, which has had tolearn quickly to survive in the Sovietreality of corruption, dishonesty, mistrust,etc.

Ms. Zabytko also read an excerpt fromher as yet unpublished book of essaystitled In Chornobyl.

It is noteworthy that The SkyUnwashed is a Barnes & NobleDiscover Great New Writers book andalso a New England BooksellersAssociation Discovery selection.

The audience was treated to an award-

winning short f i lm (10 minutes)Epiphany at Chornobyl, an offshoot ofthe above-mentioned full-length film-in-progress Life In the Dead Zone. The pho-tography of the scenes and interviewswas excellent and the background music(sung by Marianna Sadowska) had a hyp-notic effect on the audience.

A lively question and answer periodfollowed the presentations, ending in a

book signing and more intimate conver-sations with the guest, accompanied by

refreshments. The net proceeds from theevent were donated towards the fundingof the documentary Life In the DeadZone.

Anyone willing to help may send at a x - d e d u c t i b l e c o n t r i b u t i o n t o :Awakening/art & culture and (Memo:Chornobyl Film), Address: Wheat StreetProductions Inc., P.O. Box 898, Apopka,FL 32704-0898

Irene Zabytko

Chornobyl anniversary to be markedwith conferences in New York, D.C.

NEW YORK On April 26 and 27

a two-day conference on Chornobylwill take place at the United Nations,under the title Nuclear Energy:History Revisited.

The program, on Tuesday, April26, which begins at 3 p.m. will con-sist of two panels: Chornobyl:Lessons for Nuclear Safety andReflections on Chornobyl 25 YearsLater. The first panel will includeremarks by Dr. Christine K. Durbak,conference chair and founder ofWorld Information Transfer, andYuriy Sergeyev, permanent represen-tative of Ukraine to the UnitedNations.

Invited speakers also include U.N.Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon;

U.N. General Assembly PresidentJoseph Deisst; and U.N. DevelopmentProgram Administrator Helen Clark.

The keynote address will be deliv-ered by Volodymyr Holosha, viceminister of emergencies, Ukraine.

The second panel includes the fol-lowing presenters: a representative ofthe European Union (invited); EugeneCzolij president, UWC; TamaraOlexy, president of the UkrainianCongress Committee of America;Nadia McConnell U.S.-UkraineFoundation; Prof. Timothy Mousseau,dean, University of South Carolina;Mary Szkambara, president of theWorld Federation of UkrainianWomens Organiza t ions ; and,Marianna Zajac, President of theUkrainian National Womens Leagueof America.

The second day of the conferencebegins at 10 a.m. and will focus onthe topic Nuclear Energy: FromCradle to Grave.

The keynote address will be deliv-ered by Dr. Maureen Hatch, NationalCancer Institute, Chornobyl Study.

A p a n e l , m o d e r a t e d b y

Ambassador Valeriy Kuchinsky, for-mer permanent representative ofUkraine to the U.N., will follow andwill include the following invitedspeakers: Werner Obermeyer, WorldHealth Organization, New Yorkoffice; Dr. Andrew Sowder, ElectricPower Research Institute; LorenSetlow, U.S. Environment ProtectionAgency (retired); Steve Nesbit, DukeEnergy; Rod McCullum, NuclearEnergy Institute; and Prof. TimothyMousseau, dean, University of SouthCarolina.

Those interested in attending theU.N. conference should contact theUCCA National Office no later thanApril 18 either by phone (212-228-

6840) or by e-mail ([email protected]).In Washington, the CongressionalUkrainian Caucus, along with theUkrainian Congress Committee ofAmer ica and the Embassy of Ukraine, are hosting a half-day con-ference to mark the 25th anniversaryof the Chornobyl nuclear accident.The conference, which will be heldfrom 9 a.m. until 1 p.m. will takeplace at the Cannon House OfficeBuilding.

The program will consist of threepanels on the topics of ecologicaleffects, health effects and generaleffects of the Chornobyl catastrophe.Among the speakers are KathleenRyan, The Chornobyl Project; MaryMycio, author of WormwoodForest; and experts from the WorldHealth Organization and the U.S.Department of Energy.

For more information about theWashington conference or to register,readers should contact the UkrainianNational Information Service eitherby phone (202-547-0018) or e-mail([email protected]).

RFE/RL

YEREVAN Armenian President SerzhSarkisian says he has asked U.S. PresidentBarack Obama to explicitly describe theWorld War I-era mass killings ofArmenians in Ottoman Turkey as geno-cide, RFE/RLs Armenian Service reportedon April 1.

Mr. Sarkisian said he also expressedhope that Mr. Obama would use the politi-cally sensitive term in his next public state-ment on the massacre anniversary to bemarked on April 24.

Naturally, our desire has always beenand is that, in his annual address, the presi-dent of the United States makes a veryexplicit evaluation and utters the wordgenocide, President Sarkisian said at anews conference with visiting Swiss

President Micheline Calmy-Rey.

I have spoken out on more than one

occasion and can now say that in the past Ihave personally asked the U.S. president toutter that word, he said.

Mr. Obama repeatedly pledged to ensurean official U.S. recognition of the genocidewhen he ran for president. He has notdelivered on that pledge, saying only thathe stands by his past statements on the sub-

je

The Ukrainian Weekly 2011-15

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