Eugene Czolij
Canada
Eugene Czolij was called to the Quebec Bar in 1982 and is a senior partner at Lavery, de Billy, one of the largest law firms in Quebec, with more than 175 lawyers. His legal practice includes corporate and commercial litigation, as well as insolvency and financial restructuring law. He pleads before the Supreme Court of Canada, as well as all court levels in Quebec.
Since 2012, he has been listed by Best Lawyers in Canada in his areas of practice. Best Lawyers is one of the oldest and most respected publications in the legal profession.
In 2020, he was appointеd Honorary Consul of Ukraine in Montreal.
In 2016, he received an honorary doctorate from Lviv Polytechnic National University in Ukraine for his contribution to promoting Ukraine’s interests and its Euro-integration.
In 2019, he received an honorary doctorate from the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy in Ukraine for his outstanding achievements as a community leader.
Since 1993, he has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Ukrainian World Congress. For 10 years, from 2008 to 2018, he was President of the Ukrainian World Congress. In his second five-year term as Ukrainian World Congress President, he made 147 international trips to 51 countries, where he had 1,500 bilateral meetings with Church hierarchs and high-level officials of state governments and international organizations (such as the UN, OSCE, Council of Europe, NATO and the EU), gave 160 public speeches at official events, and had 200 community meetings. In 2019, he has been the Head of the Ukrainian World Congress International Observation Mission to Ukraine’s Presidential and Parliamentary Elections.
Since 2019, he has been President of the NGO “Ukraine-2050”, a non-profit organization established to help implement, within one generation – by 2050 – strategies for the sustainable development of Ukraine as a fully independent, territorially integral, democratic, reformed and economically competitive European state.
Since 2019, he has been President of the Kyiv-Mohyla Foundation of Canada, a not-for-profit corporation that supports the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy in Ukraine and students of Ukrainian origin attending post-secondary institutions in Canada.
Since 2004, he has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Caisse populaire Desjardins Ukrainienne de Montréal, a Ukrainian Canadian credit union (he was President from 2006 to 2019). Since 2006, he has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Council of Ukrainian Credit Unions of Canada. Since 2018, he has been a member of the East of Montreal Community Collaboration Group of the Fédération des caisses Desjardins du Québec, the largest cooperative financial group in Canada (from 2009 to 2018, he was a member of the Council of Representatives, East of Montreal, of the Fédération des caisses Desjardins du Québec).
Since 1994, he has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress (he was President from 1998 to 2004).
He has received several awards, including the Order of Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky, the highest award of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church, the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, the Queen Elizabeth II Golden Jubilee Medal, the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise – V Degree, the Order of Merit of Ukraine – III Degree, the Commemorative Medal of the President of Ukraine – “25 years of the Independence of Ukraine”, the Medal of the National Olympic Committee of Ukraine, the St. Voldymyr the Great Medal of the Ukrainian World Congress, and the Shevchenko Medal of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress.
He is married to Anna and they have three children – Melania, Stephane and Sophie – and two grandchildren – Zachary and Julia.
