KYIV - The Community of Ukrainians in Russia (CUR) and the
Federal National-Cultural Autonomy (FNCA) of Ukrainians of Russia
express regret and surprise at the actions of Russian authorities that
practically made it impossible to hold the international action
Everburning Candle by Ukrainian organizations in Russian regions, the
statement of CUR and FNCA reads, UKRINFORM own correspondent reports.
Only Ukrainian organizations in Moscow and Saint Petersburg
managed to hold large-scale events, even the Russian Orthodox Church
refused (except Moscow) to hold commemorations and called them
"inexpedient".
2.
"THE GREAT FAMINE: EITHER IN A .RU WAY OR IN NO WAY"
Ukrainian paper says
commemoration of 1930s famine banned in Russia
Ukrayina
Moloda, Kiev, Ukraine in Ukrainian 10 Oct 08, p 2
BBC Monitoring Service, United Kingdom, Friday, October 10, 2008
The following is the text of an article by Oleh Snihur entitled "The
Great Famine: either in a .ru way or in no way" and published in the
Ukrainian newspaper Ukrayina Moloda on 10 October:
The Kremlin's official response to the commemoration by Ukrainians
living in Russia of the victims of the 1930s famine, a series of
memorial events called The Inextinguishable Candle, has resulted in
another row in Ukrainian-Russian relations.
The events held by Ukraine in association with the Ukrainian
World Congress throughout the world and including memorial services,
mournful processions and requiems for those innocently killed during
the terribly tragic period in the history of the Ukrainian nation faced
state censorship in Russia.
First, the Russian authorities agreed to hold the memorial events,
scheduled for 6 October, but, before the commemoration, the Ukrainian
embassy in Moscow received a note from the Russian Foreign Ministry in
which Russians, citing Ukraine's position on the 1932-33 famine and
information coming from the Russian regions where The Inextinguishable
Candle was to be held demanded that the events either be held in line
with Russia's position or cancelled. Official Russian historians insist
that the famine occurred all across the Soviet Union and was caused by
"erroneous policies" and "droughty years of poor harvest".
The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry condemned these actions in an official
statement: "Thus there is a suggestion to Ukrainian NGOs in Russia that
they should not even remember the biggest humanitarian catastrophe in
the history of Ukraine killing millions of Ukrainians."
According to the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, Russia's federal
authorities in the regions where the events were to be held exerted
pressure on Ukrainian activists and intimidated them.
Oleh Voloshchuk, the press secretary of the Ukrainian embassy in
Russia, has told Ukrayina Moloda, that the local officials held
'explanatory sessions' with Ukrainian activists in Orenburg and Ufa.
"The Russian authorities simply made it clear that they
would not give permission to hold such events because not only do they
regard as unacceptable the term genocide but also cannot stand the
frequent use of the word Holodomor [Ukrainian for the 1930s famine],"
Voloshchuk said. "So we had to give up plans to hold the events, which
should have involved the ambassador, in the regions in a public and
centralized way."
Russia's Ukrainians will be able to honour the victims of the famine in
a fully-fledged way only on the grounds of the Ukrainian embassy on 13
October. Ukrainian diplomats cannot do more, since they have no powers.
"We support in all possible ways activists in the regions but they are
Russian citizens, although of Ukrainian descent, and so we cannot tell
the Russian authorities how to treat them," Voloshchuk said.
The Foreign Ministry only said that it viewed Russia's actions as
"another unfriendly and planned act against Ukraine and Ukrainians in
Russia". We can only think now: if only the Ukrainian authorities were
as firm towards some activists of the so-called Russian-speaking
population whose chauvinistic statements Moscow defends with all
possible diplomatic and nondiplomatic means.
3.
UKRAINE WORRIED WITH RUSSIAN LEADERSHIP'S OPPOSING ACTION OF EVERBURNING
CANDLE TO COMMEMORATE HOLODOMOR OF 1932-1933 IN RUSSIA
Ilona Yarmoliuk, Ukrainian News Agency, Kyiv, Ukraine, Friday, October
10, 2008
KYIV - Ukraine is worried with the Russian leadership's opposing to the
action called Everburning Candle held on territory of Russia in frames
of the commemoration of the Holodomor famine in Ukraine of 1932-33.
This follows from a statement made by the Foreign Affairs Ministry of
Ukraine.
"The Ukrainian side is troubled about the information that
representatives of the Russian federal authorities in regions, where
the Everburning Candle
action is planned, pressurize activists of the Ukrainian community to
intimidate them and disrupt the action," the statement reads.
The Foreign Ministry stresses that the Russian side gave its official
approval for holding the action on territory of Russia.
The department mentions, on the eve of the action, on 6 October, the
Ukrainian Embassy in Russia received a note from the Russian Ministry
of Foreign Affairs in which the ministry, referring to Ukraine's
position regarding Holodomor of 1932-33 and to the information from the
regions where the action was to be held, demanded adjustment of the
scheduled events to Russia's position or cancellation of the action.
"A large-scale schemed campaign, actually aimed at banning Russian
citizens of Ukrainian origin from enjoying their right for historic
memory," the
statement reads.
Also the Foreign Ministry stressed that Ukraine concerns over such a
political opposing to the action of commemorating the famine victims.
"The
Ukrainian side takes these acts as another unfriendly and previously
schemed action against Ukraine and Ukrainians in Russia," the statement
reads.
At the same time the Foreign Ministry hopes that Russia will realize
that the Everburning Candle action is deprived of politicization and
that this country will not obstruct manifestation of Ukrainians' will
in it.
The international action Everburning Candle started in April in
Australia. The aim of the action is to inform the global community on
the truth about the tragedy of the Ukrainian nation. In 2008 the action
will be held in thirty-three countries where Ukrainians live and will
finish in November in Ukraine.
As Ukrainian News reported, in March, Russia called on the United
Nations not to recognize Holodomor of 1932-33 as an act of genocide
against
Ukrainian people.
4.
UKRAINE'S MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS CALLS RUSSIA'S RESTRICTIONS
OF
EVERBURNING CANDLE ACTION AN UNFRIENDLY MOVE
Ukrinform,
Kyiv, Ukraine, Wednesday, October 8, 2008
KYIV - The Foreign Affairs Ministry of Ukraine has spread a
statement over Russia's position on holding in its territory an
international action
Everburning Candle in memory of the 75th anniversary of the
1932 - 1933 Great Famine (Holodomor) in Ukraine.
The action organized by the Ukrainian state together with the World
Congress of Ukrainians has taken place in 29 countries of the world,
and its conduct in Russia with the participation of the Ukrainian
community was officially agreed with authorities, the MFA says.
Yet, on the eve of the events, October 6, 2008. Ukraine's embassy in
Russia received a note saying that the events being brought in line
with the official position of the Russian Federation are cancelled.
The Ukrainian ministry says “Ukraine cannot realize the denial by the
Russian party of the generally known facts of the crimes bearing the
signs of genocide”.
A source of Ukraine's particular concern is information that
representatives of Russian federal authorities in regions where the
action must take place pressurize Ukrainian community to frighten them
and frustrate the events. “It is a large-scale planed campaign aimed
actually as banning the Russian citizens of Ukrainian origin to realize
their right to historical memory, memorizing millions of totalitarian
rule victims, also recognized in Russia,” the Ukrainian ministry says.
“The Ukrainian party describes this move as a fresh unfriendly and
planned action against Ukraine and Ukrainians in Russia,” the MFA says
yet voicing hope that Russia realizes that the action has no political
background, and there will be no obstacles to the expression of
Ukrainians' will in the Russian Federation.
5.
UKRAINE'S EMBASSY IN RUSSIA COMMEMORATES FAMINE VICTIMS
Ukrinform,
Kyiv, Ukraine, Tuesday, October 14, 2008
KYIV - Ukraine's Embassy in Russia honored the memory of the victims of
the Famine of 1932-1933 as part of the Inextinguishable Candle
international project, an UKRINFORM correspondent in Russia reported.
Ukrainian Ambassador to Russia Kostiantyn Hryshchenko said at the
ceremony that these tragic events remain not only in the memory of
millions of Ukrainians, but also in the memory of Russians, Greeks,
Germans, and other nations that found themselves in the disaster area
created by the totalitarian regime.
The events were planned to be large-scale, however, the Russian
authorities rendered no assistance in their organization. The
ambassador believes that the Russian authorities do not understand what
Ukraine wants to achieve through this project.
"Russia and the Russian people cannot be accused of crimes
committed by the regime, including against Russians. But if we fail to
recognize the entire depth of that terror, which the Ukrainian, Kazakh
and Russian nations have lived through, and if we fail to restore the
proper historical remembrance, we will fail to guarantee that any other
tragedy does not repeat in the future," Hryshchenko said.
A requiem for the famine victims will be held in one of the largest
cathedrals in Moscow.
Ukrainian Deputy Foreign Minister Yuriy Kostenko said that the
Inextinguishable Candle project had already been organized in 29
countries and added that Ukraine does not want to politicize this event
and does not want it to be an obstacle to friendly relations with all
states, including Russia.
In Russia, the project was held in Tyumen and is also to be organized
in Saint Petersburg and Rostov-on-Don where Ukraine has its consulates.
After Russia, the project will be held in Armenia.
On October 6, the Russian Foreign Ministry sent a note to Ukraine in
which the Russian side, referring to Ukraine's position on the famine,
demanded that events honoring the memory of famine victims be held in
Russia in accordance with the Russian position or be cancelled.
According to various estimates, an artificial famine, or the Holodomor,
which was organized by the communist regime, killed some seven to ten
million Ukrainian citizens (25% of the country's population), including
around four million children, due to the confiscation of food in the
early 1930s.
6.
UKRAINE TO PUBLISH MEMORY BOOK OF HOLODOMOR 1932-1933 VICTIMS BY
NOVEMBER
Alla
Stadnyk, Ukrainian News Agency, Kyiv, Ukraine, Thursday, October 9,
2008
KYIV - By late October the Cabinet of Ministers
will have published 17 regional volumes, one Kyiv's and one
All-Ukrainian volume to be included in the National Memory Book about
Holodomor 1932-1933 victims in Ukraine. This is stated in a
press-release circulated by the Public Relations Department of the
Cabinet of Ministers' Secretariat.
Addressing the meeting of the organizing committee for commemorative
events on the 75th anniversary of Holodomor 1932-1933 Vice Prime
Minister Ivan Vasiunyk said presentation of the project was slated for
November 21.
In 2007-2008 Ukraine made a breakthrough in clearing up Holodomor
issues, he said calling on Holodomor research not to stop gathering
evidence to complete the Memory Book.
Vasiunyk also emphasized the need for thorough planning and coordinated
activity of Ukrainian authorities at all levels in preparing and
holding memorial events on November 21-22.
As Ukrainian News reported, Kyiv will host on November 22 an
international forum devoted to the 75th anniversary of Holodomor
1932-1933.
Yuschenko declared 2008 the Year of Commemoration of the Holodomor
Victims. Holodomor 1932-1933 took lives of 3 to 7 million people.
7.
"OUR DAILY BREAD" HOLODOMOR EXHIBITION TO OPEN IN CHICAGO
OCT. 24
Exhibition
to feature fifty-four Holodomor artworks by Ukrainian artists
“They put a gun to your
head and made you swear you would bring in grain the next day.
Everyone cried. There was
nothing left to bring!” Hanna Ikasivna Cherniuk, Holodomor survivor
Ukrainian
National Museum, Chicago, Illinois, Wednesday, October 15, 2008
CHICAGO
- “Our Daily Bread”, an exhibition of artworks
commemorating the Ukrainian Holodomor-Genocide, opens Friday, October
24th at the Ukrainian National Museum, 2249 West Superior, in
Chicago.
“Our Daily Bread” officially opens at 6:30 PM with a program
that features a short video by Ukrainian singer Oksana Bilozir and an
opening statement by the granddaughter of a Holodomor survivor, Ms.
Oryna Hrushetsky-Schiffman.
In 1932 and 1933, between seven and 10 million Ukrainians
were deliberately starved to death during the “Holodomor” - or death by
starvation. This genocide was masterminded by Joseph Stalin and his
inner circle, and was carried out by Soviets who confiscated every last
bit of food from Ukrainian peasants who were resistant to collective
farming - and who represented the backbone of the Ukrainian people.
This year, 2008, marks the 75th anniversary of the Holodomor, and the
government of Ukraine as well as Ukrainians around the world have been
organizing events in an effort to expose and publicize this crime
against humanity while there are still survivors young enough to recall
its horrors.
EXHIBITION
FEATURES 54 HOLODOMOR ARTWORKS
In Chicago, the latest event commemorating
the Holodomor is an exhibition at the Ukrainian National Museum opening
Friday, October 24th. “Our Daily Bread” features 54 artworks that are
part of the “Holodomor: Through The Eyes of Ukrainian Artists”
collection.
The founder and trustee of the unusual collection, U.S.
businessman Morgan Williams, gathered the over 350 original
Holodomor artworks in the collection during the last 11 years in
Ukraine. Williams is director, government
affairs, Washington, D.C., for the SigmaBleyzer private equity
investment group and serves as president of the U.S.-Ukraine Business
Council (USUBC).
Most of the artworks were created
after 1988, when Ukrainians were finally free to
evoke the suffering and horrors of the Holodomor in the last days of
the USSR, right before Ukraine declared independence in
1991. Before 1988 no one was allowed to talk about this
tragedy let alone express themselves through artwork or
writings. Many Ukrainian artists may very well have only
learned of the Holodomor at that time, after decades of extreme Soviet
suppression of the atrocities.
The government of Ukraine has officially declared the
Holodomor a genocide against the Ukrainian people and is asking the
United Nations to do so as well. Just this past September, the United
States House of Representatives passed a Resolution condemning the
Holodomor and the former Soviet government’s deliberate confiscation of
grain harvests, which resulted in the starvation of millions of
Ukrainian men, women, and children.
It was a devastating chapter of Stalin’s reign of terror that wiped out
one quarter of the peasantry - and later included the intelligentsia
and other leaders of Ukrainian society who were shot and exiled by the
hundreds of thousands in an attempt to destroy the Ukrainian nation.
And it was carried out at a time when Ukraine, then officially the
Ukrainian SSR, had one of the richest farmlands in the world - “the
breadbasket of Europe.”
The exhibition will also include a room depicting what life was like in
Ukraine prior to enforced collectivization—as well as an evocative
walk-through installation depicting the horrors of the Holodomor.
The "Our Daily Bread" Holodomor exhibition is on view
through Sunday, November 30, 2008. The Museum hours are Thursday
to Sunday from 11:00 a.m. to 4:00
pm. The Ukrainian National Museum is located at 2249
West Superior Street in the Ukrainian Village neighborhood. Call
312-421-8020 or visit the Museum's website,
www.ukrainiannationalmuseum.org for
more information.
8.
HOLODMOR COMMEMORATION ACTIVITIES
From: Nataliya Shulga, Kyiv, Ukraine, October 15, 2008
9.
HOLODOMOR - EUROPEAN UNION
Best regards, Luís
==============================================
Mr. E. Morgan Williams, Director
Government Affairs, Washington Office
SigmaBleyzer Private Equity Investment Group
President/CEO, U.S.-Ukraine Business Council (USUBC)
Publisher & Editor, Action Ukraine Report (AUR)
Trustee: "Holodomor: Through The Eyes of Ukrainian Artists"
1701 K Street, NW, Suite 703, Washington, D.C. 20006
Mobile in Kyiv: 380 50 689 2975
[email protected];
[email protected]
www.sigmableyzer.com;
www.usubc.org