СВІТОВИЙ КОНҐРЕС УКРАЇНЦІВ UKRAINIAN WORLD CONGRESS
  CONGRÈS MONDIAL UKRAINIEN CONGRESO MUNDIAL UCRANIO  

NEWSLETTER

UKRAINIAN WORLD CONGRESS

№ 1 (29) –January, 2006

  UWC URGES PREPARATION FOR 75TH GREAT FAMINE OBSERVANCES

          In preparation for the upcoming observances of the Great Famine anniversary 2007-08, the UWC urges its central national representations as well as other member organizations to commence preparations. In particular, we urge the introduction of resolutions on the Great Famine in your respective parliaments as sponsorship, debate and passage generally take time. During the 70th anniversary observances our communities were inefficient in that only the parliaments of Аrgentina, Australia, Canada, Hungary and the United States adopted resolutions. Since then, Lithuania and Georgia have come on board. We submit for your consideration and use a sample text, which may be used in full, in part or in amendment form for your specific purpose. The salient point is that your parliament recognizes the Great Famine as Genocide against the Ukrainian people. All other issues should be deemed collateral.

INTERNATIONAL OBSERVERS FOR MARCH ELECTIONS

          During the last presidential elections in Ukraine the Ukrainian diaspora community fielded the largest contingent (more than 2,500) of international election observers (12,500), more than the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe delegation. Clearly, these numbers affected in particular, the across the board condemnation of the November 21, 2004 fiasco, the subsequent amendment of the election law in early December 2004 and the generally acceptable showing on December 26, 2004. The current election legislation for March 2006 has taken into consideration the pervasive fraud of the past and to a large degree reflects the amendments introduced for the final runoff in December 2004. This includes a limit on transitory ballots as well as an equitable distribution of positions on precinct commissions among the competing parties for self-monitoring. The UWC feels that given these safeguards the March 2006 election will not require a record number of international observers as in the past. Nonetheless, we urge those members of our communities who are willing and able to become election observers. UWC and two of our member organizations (the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America and the Ukrainian Canadian Congress) have registered with Ukraine’s Central Election Commission to sponsor observers. Those individuals wishing to serve may contact the UWC at congress@look.ca, UCCA at ucca@ucca.org or the UCC at ucc@ucc.ca. Registration is available on line.   

UWC BOARD OF DIRECTORS TO MEET IN KYIV IN 2006

          The 2005 Board of Directors session in Kharkiv was highly successful, in particular, because the venue enabled widespread participation from five continents. The Executive Committee has decided to hold the next Board of Directors meeting in Kyiv in tandem with the fifteenth anniversary of Ukraine’s independence. We are hoping to include in our session non-member communities from a sixth continent, Africa, with whom we have been in continuous communication for more than a year. Since time is always a factor, we urge all our members and guests to set aside approximately one week from August 21-28, 2006. During that span of time we hope to participate in the IV Forum on the eve of independence observances, take part in independence festivities, schedule high level meetings with Ukraine’s governments officials and a convene our own Board of Directors session at the conclusion. Please plan accordingly.

THE WEST’S MORAL IMPERATIVE OR IS IT OK TO BE SELFISH

          The Ukraine-Russia gas row can be summarized as follows: one third of Ukraine’s natural gas supply comes from Russia. In the cold of winter 2005-06, Russia insisted on quadrupling the price of its gas delivery to Ukraine. Ukraine declined. Russia then cut off its supply resulting in energy shortage in Ukraine and collateral issues dealing with Russian gas transit to Europe through Ukrainian territory. Western Europe responded with extreme indignation. Russia apparently blinked, restoring most of the withheld gas to accommodate the West. However, simultaneously, Russia cut off Ukraine’s supply of natural gas from Turkmenistan.

          Much commentary condemned Russia for attempting to influence political issues in Ukraine with this crisis or at the very least to punish Ukraine for electing the wrong candidate during the last Presidential elections and suggesting that amends may be made in the March Parliamentary elections. Interestingly enough, President Putin’s proposed compromise of a three-month grace period before the price increase would take effect, appears to coincide with the new election timetable. Additionally, Russia was criticized for reneging on its European Energy Charter obligations. Suffice it to say that this dispute affected not only Ukraine and Russia, but also countries in Western Europe and in fact the industrial world inasmuch as Russia contemporaneously assumed the chair of the Group of 8.

          Ukraine’s subjugation to Russia has lasted over three hundred years. Without exaggeration no single nation on earth has suffered more at the hands of its neighbor. Despite this, the United States of America and other leading political and industrial nations have lumped Ukraine with Russia for years in every imaginable equation, including nuclear disarmament, entry to the World Trade Organization and NATO, etc. Presidents have visited Ukraine routinely only on the way to or from Moscow. Accommodations have been made on behalf of Russia bordering on the ridiculous with Russia’s chairmanship of the G-8 an egregious example. Russia has taken advantage in each instance.

        This crisis becomes still another test for the West. Our hope is that this lesson in Russian bullying is not lost on Western Europe and the United States. Russia blinked, the crisis for Western Europe has been averted seemingly but it remains very real for Ukraine, in particular with the Turkmen cutoff, which does not affect the West directly. Will the Western position revert to business as usual?  Russia should not be isolated. Nor should it be pandered to. The problem with bullies is that they do not back down unless they are stood up to. If Russia wishes to be a player in the civilized world community, it needs to act appropriately. Civility, not to mention international accords, mandates respecting Ukraine’s independence. The question for the moment and perhaps the next generation is whether Western indignation is morally principled or simply selfish.

APPENDIX

RESOLUTION

ON THE 75TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE GREAT FAMINE 1932-33 IN UKRAINE

     In 2007-8 the world community  will commemorate the 75th anniversary of the  Famine of 1932-33 in Ukraine, when more than 7,000,000 Ukrainian men, women and children lost their lives. This tragedy was not the result of a natural disaster but the consequence of a  calculated policy by the Soviet communist regime under Josef Stalin in Moscow to break the will of the  Ukrainian people.  The (political entity-parliament) expresses the sense that the 75th anniversary of the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33 should serve to honor the memory of the victims, recognize this tragedy as Genocide against the Ukrainian people, condemn the Soviet communist perpetrators, acknowledge the failure of the world community to react with appropriate opprobrium and urge contemporary and future world communities to be vigilant against any manifestations of repression and inhumanity.

Whereas in 1932-33  in what is now Ukraine, at least 7,000,000 men, women and children lost their lives as a consequence of the deprivation of basic sustenance which resulted in widespread famine;

Whereas these millions of Ukrainians died not of natural causes but as a result of a calculated inhuman policy designed to punish Ukrainians for their resistance and opposition to the Soviet Union’s political and economic oppression and spiritual (religious and cultural) Russification,  including the forced collectivization of agriculture, the liquidation of  Ukrainian religion, culture and science;

Whereas there is clear and conclusive evidence of the criminal intent of the perpetrators as the central government of the former Soviet Union from Moscow orchestrated the appropriation of grain from Ukraine, exported 1,700,000 tons to the West,  tightly controlled the borders of Ukraine to preclude starving Ukrainians from crossing into Russia or other countries in search of bread and rejected offers from international relief organizations to assist the starving population  with denials of famine in Ukraine and assurances of no need for assistance;

Whereas complicit with Soviet denials, some from the West  conspired  to conceal and lend credence to Soviet propaganda and some governments such as that of the United States of America even extended diplomatic relations to the Soviet Union at the height of this Soviet atrocity; 

Whereas one of the more notorious offenders in Soviet complicity, a journalist, one Walter Duranty from The New York Times not only touted Soviet propaganda of collectivization and denied the ravages of the Famine, but conspired to defraud his readers as well as the global community and was awarded a Pulitzer prize in journalism for his efforts;

Whereas in his study The Harvest of Sorrow, the British historian Robert Conquest depicted the magnitude of this tragedy: “A quarter of the rural population, men, women, and children, lay dead or dying, the rest in various stages of debilitation with no strength to bury their families or neighbors;”

Whereas the United States Congress Commission’s report in 1988 confirmed that the government of the former Soviet Union in 1932-33 consciously used the brutal policy of forced famine to repress the Ukrainian people, to oppress the Ukrainians’ inviolable religious and political rights and concluded that the Famine in Ukraine 1932-33 was  Genocide against the Ukrainian  people as subsequently defined by the United Nations Convention on Genocide;

Whereas government bodies of several countries in their official documents and resolutions have recognized and acknowledged the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33 as Genocide;

Whereas the President of Ukraine on the 25th of November 2005 appealed to all countries of the world community to recognize the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33 as Genocide;

Whereas pursuant to a Ukrainian presidential decree from the 26th of November 1998, Ukrainian communities worldwide commemorate this tragedy  annually particularly in the month of November and the 75th anniversary shall be an occasion for special even more widespread and significant observances; 
Whereas many Ukrainians who survived the Ukrainian Famine (Holodomor) of 1932-33 emigrated to (country of reference) and they, their children, granchildren and new arrivals of Ukrainian ethnicity all have made a positive and substantial contribution to its growth and development; 

Whereas (country of reference) condemns all atrocities, crimes against humanity and genocides and the  citizens of (country of reference) highly value and defend human rights:

Now, therefore, be it resolved by (the political entity):

  1. That the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33 be recognized and acknowledged as Genocide against the Ukrainian people;
  2. That the victims of the Ukrainian Famine 1932-33  be solemnly remembered on its 75th anniversary and the month of November be designated in (country of reference) annually as a particular time to reflect upon the Ukrainian Famine 1932-33;
  3. That the communist regime of The Soviet Union with its center in Moscow be condemned for its systematic disregard for human life, human rights, human liberty and self-determination that characterized the repressive policies of Joseph Stalin and his henchmen during the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33;
  4. That those from the West who were complicit in the coverup thereby facilitating the crimes of the perpetrators should be rebuked even posthumously and their superiors and/or successors should  denounce them  publicly; in this regard (the politcal entity) urges the publisher of The New York Times to return the  Pulitzer prize awarded to its employee Walter Duranty and the Trustees of Columbia University’s Pulitzer Committee to revoke that award, thereby distancing themselves from complicity;
  5. That on the 75thanniversary of the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33, as Ukraine moves toward a fuller democracy with pervasive respect for human rights and free spiritual and economic opportunity, it is essential that (country of reference) continue to assist Ukraine in its endeavors aimed at the betterment of its society and people; and
  1. That any supplemental material that may assist in the dissemination of information about the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33 and thereby help prevent similar tragedies, should be compiled by historians, academicians and parliamentarians and that these be included within the educational material utilized by educational institutions in  (country of reference) and be made available worldwide for a more complete study of this great tragedy of mankind.