www.ukrweekly.com INSIDE: • Analysis: The Victory Day spectacle and beyond – page 3. • Investors sue producers of Holodomor film – page 4. • Commentary: The Obama reset and Ukraine – page 6. THEPublished U by theKRAINIAN Ukrainian National Association Inc., a fraternal Wnon-profit associationEEKLY Vol. LXXIX No. 21 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, MAY 22, 2011 $1/$2 in Ukraine Translation of U.S. scholar’s book Hunger-striking Lutsenko aims to fight historical revisionism reported to be seriously ill by Zenon Zawada and his entourage to eliminate the Kyiv Press Bureau Ukrainian peasant class – which was not only opposed to collectivization but was KYIV – Historical phenomena such also the core of Ukrainian national iden- as the Holodomor – the Famine- tity – as the biggest threat to Soviet rule. Genocide of 1932-1933 in Ukraine – They say the Holodomor was part of a have come under increasing attack from tragedy endured by the people of the Stalin apologists creeping into the main- USSR equally, without any particular stream of Russian and Ukrainian societ- nation being singled out. They argue that ies. non-Ukrainians also died in the With Kremlin support, the debate has Holodomor. degenerated questions about what The Communist Party of Ukraine caused the Holodomor to whether it was goes so far as to allege that there was no genocide at all and whether it was artificially induced famine, but merely unique to Ukraine. harvest troubles in separate regions of For example, Russian historians have Ukraine. The Holodomor concept was increasingly argued that famines in the invented at Harvard University as anti- Lower Volga basin and Kazakhstan dur- Soviet propaganda, the party alleges in ing the same period also qualify as geno- its literature. cide, making the Holodomor not unique “I came to the conclusion, and I to Ukraine. proved that Stalin persecuted the To combat such historical revisionism, Ukrainian peasants in order to disallow Dr. Norman M. Naimark’s book “Stalin’s achieving independence, to deprive them Genocides” (Princeton University Press, of their nationality, and to deprive them 2010) has been translated into Ukrainian of creating opposition to Sovietization in UNIAN/Aleksandr Kosarev and published by the National University some way,” Dr. Naimark told a May 10 Yurii Lutsenko, former internal affairs minister of Ukraine, in an April 21 photo of Kyiv Mohyla Academy. press conference in Kyiv. taken in the Kyiv appellate court, which ruled that day to keep him behind bars. Dr. Naimark’s work arrives at a time “The combination of these social and Mr. Lutsenko declared a hunger strike the next day to protest his imprisonment. when neo-Soviet cultural policies are ethno-national dimensions was at the being pursued by the administration of core of Stalin’s destructive, ruinous by Volodymyr Musyak His wife, Iryna, who’s been allowed to Viktor Yanukovych and his minister of campaign,” said the Stanford University education, science, youth and sports, Special to The Ukrainian Weekly visit him only periodically, reported on scholar. May 19 that her husband has an inflamed Dmytro Tabachnyk. These policies reject Dr. Naimark’s book was translated by KYIV – The life of imprisoned former esophagus, 20 intestinal ulcers and deterio- notions of Russification and Soviet sub- Vasyl Starko in record time, said Dr. Internal Affairs Minister Yurii Lutsenko, rating blood vessels in the brain. Doctors jugation of the Ukrainian nation, and Serhiy Kvit, rector of the National cast the Soviet experience in a largely who has been on a hunger strike since had previously said starvation caused a University of Kyiv Mohyla Academy. chronically inflamed pancreas and Type 2 positive light. In the book Dr. Naimark offers evi- April 22, is reportedly in danger as he Their political force, the Party of awaits a corruption trial that is widely diabetes. Prominent leaders called upon dence that Stalin’s genocides persisted Mr. Lutsenko to stop starving himself Regions of Ukraine, rejects the idea that during the period between the early viewed as part of the Ukrainian govern- the Holodomor was a genocide orches- ment’s political persecution of the oppo- before he does permanent harm to himself. trated by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin (Continued on page 4) sition. (Continued on page 22) Chicago community commemorates Chornobyl anniversary by Anna Mostovych Vera Eliashevsky, chair of the Kyiv Core lessons of Chornobyl Committee of Chicago Sister Cities CHICAGO – Twenty five years after International, which spearheaded the For Dr. Shcherbak, former ambassador the Chornobyl catastrophe and two event, set the evening’s tone in her intro- of Ukraine to Israel, Canada and the months after the accident at the ductory remarks. “We honor those who United States, the two disasters were Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant in perished and those who survived,” she global-scale events that affected the des- tinies of millions of people and demon- Japan, several organizations in Chicago said, requesting prayers for victims of strated that “any nuclear reactor of any joined forces to commemorate one disas- both the Chornobyl and Fukushima disas- type and any design in any country is …a ter and bring attention to the other. ters. The Rev. Myron Panchuk, co-chair delayed atom bomb that requires han- The multifaceted event – featuring a of the anniversary planning committee, dling with utmost responsibility.” keynote address by Dr. Yuri Shcherbak, then asked for a moment of silence for all In his keynote address, “Chornobyl: the presentation of awards to Chornobyl the victims. 25 Years After: Lessons for Mankind,” researchers, a photography exhibit and a Co-chair Dr. Daniel Hryhorchuk, direc- Dr. Shcherbak, who flew in from Kyiv documentary film – was held at the tor of global environmental health at UIC Chicago Cultural Center on Thursday especially for the commemoration, drew College of Medicine, extended “empathy on his experience as an eyewitness to the evening, April 28. and solidarity to the people of Japan” and Chornobyl disaster and as Ukraine’s first Walter Tun Some 350 people, representing read official greetings from various digni- minister of environmental protection, as Chicago’s diplomatic corps, the Dr. Yuri Shcherbak delivers the key- taries, including Chicago Mayor Richard well as on his expertise as a medical doc- note address at the Chicago commemo- Consulates of Japan and Ukraine, and M. Daley, Ambassador Oleksandr Motsyk tor and epidemiologist. ration of the 25th anniversary of the members of the Ukrainian American and of Ukraine and Dr. Boris Lushniak, depu- Chornobyl nuclear disaster. greater Chicago communities, attended. ty surgeon general of the United States. (Continued on page 8) 2 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, MAY 22, 2011 No. 21 ANALYSIS NEWSBRIEFS Opposition remains fragmented Rada won’t condemn Putin’s remarks fies that we are a united people, the soli- darity of which nobody and nothing can KYIV – The Verkhovna Rada has destroy.” (Interfax –Ukraine) ahead of 2012 parliamentary election refused to condemn the statement by by Pavel Korduban evil on the national scale. Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin Investors sour on Ukraine diminishing the role of Ukraine in the vic- Eurasia Daily Monitor Opinion polls conducted this year and tory in the Great Patriotic War of 1941- LONDON – Reform has ground to a in 2010 show that Svoboda’s popularity halt in Ukraine, which is losing its invest- Clashes between far-right and pro- 1945, it was reported on May 18. The has been on the rise, but it is far from ment appeal, investors said during the sev- Russian activists married the Victory Day draft response of the Ukrainian Parliament supplanting the YTB as the most popular enth Adam Smith Conference summit in ceremonies in the western Ukrainian city to Mr. Putin, filed by the opposition fac- opposition party. It is currently only the London. The situation in Ukraine is disap- of Lviv on May 9. tion Our Ukraine–People’s Self-Defense, third most popular opposition force. pointing, said Timothy Ash, director for Militants from the far-right Svoboda received only 97 votes. The rejected draft According to opinion polls by the Kyiv- emerging market research at Royal Bank party beat up pro-Russian activists, who statement also proposed calling on the based Razumkov think-tank, the share of of Scotland, according to May 16 news arrived in Lviv from Russophone south- Ukrainians who are ready to vote for Russian government to treat with respect ern regions, clashed with police, burned the tragic pages of Ukraine’s history and reports. Prospects were good a year ago Svoboda increased from 2.8 percent in and it seemed that remarkable people in red flags and destroyed a wreath which August 2010 to 4.6 percent in April 2011. to prevent speculation on sensitive topics. the Russian consul, Oleg Astakhov, was Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on the administration would not only talk, but Over the same period, support for the also promote reform, he said. Everything going to lay at the local cemetery. One YTB grew from 13.7 percent to 17.9 per- December 16, 2010, said that the USSR member of Svoboda was shot in the leg would have won the war even without looked promising until November 2010, cent. The figures for the second most when the process of reforms halted, said by a local pro-Russian activist (www. popular opposition party, the Front for Ukraine. The Foreign Affairs Ministry of Anders Aslund, senior researcher at the zaxid.net, Ukrayinska Pravda, May 9). Change, which is headed by charismatic Ukraine did not give an official response Peterson Institute for International Lviv Oblast Governor Mykhailo and young former chairman of the to the statement, describing it as the per- Economics. Mr. Ash also said that half of Tsymbaliuk, pressed by the Svoboda Verkhovna Rada Arseniy Yatsenyuk, sonal position of the Russian prime minis- the growth in investment in Ukraine was party, which dominates the regional improved from 5.3 percent to 10.8 per- ter.