Disappearance Raises Fresh Questions About Media Climate In Ukraine

Vasyl Klymentyev was last seen last week, when he met a colleague to discuss an article he was writing about a local prosecutor and a tax official.

The editor of "Novyy Styl," a weekly newspaper in the eastern city of Kharkiv, Klymentyev is a well-known critic of the authorities. Police say they suspect he may have been killed.

Klymentyev's deputy, Petro Matviyenko, told RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service that he and Klymentyev had met on August 11 to discuss photographs they'd taken of mansions belonging to regional tax chief Stanislav Denisyuk and other officials.

The authorities say Klymentyev was last seen later that day getting into a BMW with an unknown man. A manhunt is under way and officials are investigating on charges of "possible premeditated murder."

Klymentyev's case is raising new questions about the state of press freedom in Ukraine after pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovych came to power earlier this year in an election that repudiated the Orange Revolution and its pro-Western leaders.

CLick here to read complete story.

Source: RFE/RL

Ukraine journalists threaten strike over press freedom

Ukraine journalists warned Sunday of strike action over work conditions, complaining of a deterioration in press freedom in the past six months under President Viktor Yanukovych. Click here to read the story here.

SOurce: China Post

Ukrainian Nationalist Groups Protest Russian Patriarch's Visit

Nationalist groups gathered near the "Ukrainian House" in Kyiv to protest Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill's visit to Ukraine, RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service reports.

The some 80 protesters gathered representing the nationalist Svoboda (Liberty) party, the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists, Ukrainian National Assembly-Ukrainian National Self Defense, and the Ukrainian People's Party.

They staged a performance called "Glamorous Tour of a Moscow KGB Agent" that was officially banned by the Kyiv authorities on July 26.

The protesters also displayed Ukrainian flags, their party banners, and placards saying "Reverend Kirill muddies the waters for the Ukrainian nation" and "No to the Moscow priest-colonizer!"

About 30 policemen watched the protest but did not intervene. No violence was reported.

Other protests during Kirill's eight-day trip had been disrupted or otherwise disallowed.

Kirill, who started his visit to Ukraine on July 20, attended a religious service on Kyiv's Volodymyr Hill on July 27 to celebrate the day of Russia's conversion to Christianity.

Source RFE/RL

Communist Ukrainian Institute Head Denies Famine Was Deliberate

KYIV -- The new director of Ukraine's National Memory Institute says that while the 1932-1933 famine in Ukraine was "the result of difficult circumstances," it was not artificially provoked, RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service reports.

Millions of Ukrainians died in the famine, which was at least partly the result of restrictions imposed by Soviet leader Josef Stalin on farmers across the Soviet Union.

Click here for complete article.

Source: RFE/RL

Patriarch Kiril must be declared persona non grata, Ukrainian party demands

While on a visit to Ukraine, Moscow Patriarch Kiril continues to fan interconfessional feud and violate the laws of Ukraine, first deputy head of the Ukrainian Party Oleh Olijnyk says. This time, however, Kiril has embarked on a different tactics regarding his provocative declarations as they are publicized not by Kiril himself but by his aides, the UP July 23 website release runs.

To illustrate, UP refers to one of the declarations made by Moscow patriarchate spokesperson to the effect that the cancellation of registration of Kyiv patriarchate property will heal the rift in Ukraine Orthodoxy [and the unraveling of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church independent from Moscow – Ed.].
“The UP persistently advises Moscow patriarchate leaders to curb their appetite and not to infringe on the property and assets not belonging to them. Similarly, Patriarch Kiril must stop driving a wedge among Orthodox believers in Ukraine and provoke conflict,” the UP statement continues.
“Otherwise, we will be forced to appeal to Pres Yanukovych and prosecution to interfere to stop the religious feud from getting into the open. We will also demand that Patriarch Kiril be banned to visit Ukraine,” the statement concludes.

Source: ZIK

Reporters Without Borders gives gloomy assessment of prospects for media freedom in Ukraine

KYIV, Ukraine — The head of the global media rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders is giving a gloomy assessment of the prospects for improved media freedom in Ukraine.

Jean-Francois Julliard said after meeting Ukrainian parliament members Tuesday that the "opposition lawmakers will make strong statements, while the pro-governmental party will say there is no problem with freedom of expression in Ukraine."

Julliard is in Kyiv for three days of talks with journalists and officials. He said the trip was prompted by alarming signs on censorship, political pressure and physical attacks against reporters since Viktor Yanukovych became president this year.

Source: The Associated Press (CP)

My national dish: the mighty pierogi

I know what you’re thinking: The pierogi is not Canadian. Tell that to my great grandmother, who brought her family recipe from the Ukraine to Alberta at the invitation of Clifford Sifton, Wilfrid Laurier’s Minister of the Interior. On the Canadian prairie, she modified her recipe – being Ukrainian, she called them perohi – to suit Canadian terroir. She substituted cheddar for cottage cheese, and tweaked the dough to make it far suppler than anything in the old country. (The secret is more yolks and less egg whites, but that’s all I’m saying).

Click here for complete article.

Source: Globe and Mail

Legendary albums

I decided to lighten up the topic a little and wanted to publish an excellent article on the many great albums and artists that are making their way in popularizing Ukrainian music and its language and culture.
Some go back to pre-independence, while many mentioned are contempoary artists in a very tough cut throat industry. While the 'popsa' scene is still flourishing in Ukraine, run by the mafia element, it is nice to see other "normal" type of music evolving in Ukraine.

If anybody is interested in purchasing any of these albums, I recommend this site very highly.

Click here to read full article.

Source: The Day

Ukrainians Ponder Performance of New Government

While reading the Kyiv Post yesterday I came accross the following article: CLICK HERE
It mentions that almost two thirds of Ukrainians support Yanukovych’s foreign policy the poll reveals.

62.9% of respondents, polled recently by the Kyiv-based Gorshenin Institute of Management Issues, said the Yanukovych foreign policy reflects their interests in varying degrees, 27.5% oppose it and 9.6% were undecided.

Not really sure if this poll would be trustworthy, I would go more along beleiving this poll more, Angus Reid Global Monitor says that one-in-four Ukrainians believe the country’s situation has improved under the new government, according to a poll by Research & Branding Group. 26 per cent of respondents think the socio-economic situation in Ukraine has become better, while 56 per cent say it has not changed substantially.

It's like the following blog and picture above: "Now you see him, now you don't."

CLICK HERE to see the results.

Source: Angus Reid Global Monitor

Two Ukrainian Opposition TV Channels Stripped Of Frequencies

Now here is real proof of freedom of speach working in Ukraine.

A court has stripped two Ukrainian TV channels -- Channel 5 and TVi -- of their new broadcast frequencies, RFE/RL's Ukrainian Service reports.

The Kyiv district court today annulled the January results of a tender held by Ukraine's National Council on Television and Radio Broadcasting that allocated those frequencies.

According to Ukrainian media experts, Channel 5 and TVi are among the few Ukrainian TV channels that provide independent news coverage.

CLICK HERE for complete story.

Source: RFE/RL

Quebec passes bill recognizing Holodomor as a genocide

QUEBEC, June 2 /CNW/ - Members of the Quebec's National Assembly today unanimously passed Bill 390 - An Act to proclaim Ukrainian Famine and Genocide (Holodomor) Memorial Day.

The Bill, which was introduced in November by MNA Louise Beaudoin and received unanimous approval at first reading, commemorates victims of the Holodomor (the engineered famine in Ukraine which murdered millions of Ukrainians in 1932-33).

The legislation recognizes the Holodomor as "the famine and genocide that occurred in Ukraine in 1932 and 1933 where millions of Ukrainians perished as victims of a famine deliberately induced by the Soviet regime under Joseph Stalin to quash the aspirations of the Ukrainian people for a free and independent Ukraine."

The Bill further builds on the 1998 Ukrainian Presidential decree, the law adopted by the Parliament of Ukraine in 2006, legislation unanimously passed by the Parliament of Canada in 2008 as well as statutes adopted by the provincial legislatures of Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Ontario which recognize the Holodomor as a genocide against the Ukrainian people and establishes the fourth Saturday in November as a Day of Remembrance for the victims of this mass atrocity.

"Today, the Government of Quebec paid tribute to the millions of innocent victims of the Holodomor, condemned the heinous crimes of the Soviet Communist regime of Joseph Stalin, and has helped to restore historical justice, stated Marika Putko, UCC Quebec Provincial Council President. "We applaud the resolve and courage of Quebec's legislators in ensuring the passage of Bill 390 which proclaims the fourth Saturday of every November as a day of remembrance - Holodomor Memorial Day and that recognizes the Holodomor of 1932-1933 as an act of genocide."

"We commend the members of the Quebec National Assembly for their work to ensure that the tragedy of the Holodomor is recognized and will no longer be whitewashed by apologists for the Soviet system." stated Paul Grod, Ukrainian Canadian Congress (UCC) National President. "Quebec becomes the sixth jurisdiction in Canada to recognize Holodomor as famine genocide. May the lesson that the World has acknowledged not be forgotten in Ukraine."

More information and link to video of video of the Quebec's National Assembly June 2, 2010 which unanimously passed Bill 390 - An Act to proclaim Ukrainian Famine and Genocide (Holodomor) Memorial Day. CLICK HERE

Source: CNW

In memory of Ilko Kucheriv

On May 29, 2010, Ukraine and all those who cared about making the world a better and democratic place lost a good friend, when the life of Ilko Kucheriv, the Director of Kyiv-based Democratic Initiatives Foundations, came to an end. It was an end that so many saw coming, while at the same time they all tried, in every way humanly possible, to extend the life of a man, father and friend who had so many plans, for a man who was 55 years young.

The average Ukrainian probably never heard of Ilko Kucheriv but anyone who had ever met him, talked with him, asked him for his opinion or advice knew that he was passionate about what he did, and he was passionate for one single reason. He wanted to make Ukraine and the world a better place, not just for himself, but also for everyone.

I, together with everyone else who knew Ilko Kucheiv, will miss him immensely. May the earth of your dear country Ukraine cradle you gently and may your soul and spirit always be nearby to guide those who want the world to be a better place.

Source: Ukraine Business On-line

By:Vasyl Pawlowsky

In Lviv, Jewish prayers over Nazi graves

Discussions are also heating up over many other divisive issues. Those include whether elevating the status of nationalist leader Stepan Bandera (1909-1959) helps or hurts the cause of unifying Ukraine’s diverse regions. Debate is also flaring over the extent to which western Ukrainians were responsible for the demise of the region’s Jewish community during World War II, and why Ukrainians from the east do not appear ready to support the version of Ukrainian nationalism their western counterparts frequently offer.

The advent of a new pro-Russian government in Kyiv that looks ready to revise Ukrainian history in a way that is more acceptable to Moscow and often maligns western Ukraine has added urgency to this reassessment. There is a feeling that if western Ukrainians don’t soon come to terms with their own regional history, it will be too late to counter the theses forwarded by a less-friendly Kyiv.


One of the most widely debated topics these days is how western Ukrainians see Bandera, the man who led the more radical wing of the Organization for Ukrainian Nationalists. The movement was founded in 1929 with the goal of uniting territorially divided Ukraine and establishing it as an independent nation.

“Yushchenko, of course, acted very badly in that he accented historical memory (during his presidency) [concerning Bandera]. It is necessary to take a more serious stance toward history. ”

- Yaroslav Hrytsak, a leading historian who heads the humanities department at Lviv’s Ukrainian Catholic University.

While many western Ukrainians admire Bandera for leading a movement that was able to withstand Soviet repression for more than two decades, not everyone agrees with the decision former President Viktor Yushchenko made earlier this year to bestow Bandera with the nation’s highest honor, the Hero of Ukraine award. They are concerned that the recognition was bestowed on the eve of the Jan. 17 presidential election – a vote that Yushchenko lost by a landslide, as predicted. The award has since divided Ukraine and allowed the region’s history and its historical figures to become objects of political manipulation.

“If you want to have a discussion in Ukraine, throw in Bandera and you will have soon it,” Yaroslav Hrytsak, a leading historian who heads the humanities department at Lviv’s Ukrainian Catholic University told an audience on May 11 during a discussion about World War II.

Click here for full article.

Інтерв’ю з о.-д-ром Борисом ҐУДЗЯКОМ з приводу тиску Служби безпеки‏

Інтерв’ю з о.-д-ром Борисом ҐУДЗЯКОМ з приводу тиску Служби безпеки України на Український католицький університет у Львові
Interview in Ukrainian with Dr. Gudziak in regards to the SBU / KGB push last week.

http://www.risu.org.ua/ua/index/expert_thought/interview/35857/

Source: RISU

SBU pressure on the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv‏

Fr. Borys Gudziak received a visit from an SBU agent(former KGB)on May 18 in a polite manner the agent related that certain political parties are planning protests and demonstrations regarding the controversial (and in some cases inflammatory) policies of the new Ukrainian authorities. Students are to be engaged in these protests. There is a danger that some of these manifestations may be marred by provocations. He stated that, of course, students are allowed to protest but that they should be warned by the university administration that those involved in any illegal activities will be prosecuted. Illegal activities include not only violent acts but also, for example, pickets blocking access to the work place of government officials (or any protests that are not sanctioned by authorities).


Click here to read complete article.

With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church became public and legal again. In 1992 the seminary resumed operations, though in a different location, because the Soviets had seized and reallocated all church property. The newly independent Ukrainian government offered the eparchy a former Pioneer (Scout) summer camp in Rudno, an adjoining suburb of Lviv. Since that time, the number of vocations to the priesthood has been high.

The seminary was re-opened but the former students of the late Cardinal Slipyi also longed to fulfill his dream a full-fledged Ukrainian Catholic University. Toward that end, they opened the re-named Lviv Theological Academy in 1994 which now provides the academic program for the seminarians. In November 1998, the revived Academy received accreditation from Rome to grant the ecclesiastical Bachelor's of Theology. In June 2000, ground was broken for a new Theological Center in the city of Lviv, which will combine the seminary residence and the University's theological faculty.

Source: UCU

Now you see him, now you don't!!!

The two presidents took part in the ceremony to lay wreaths to the Eternal Flame on the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Kiyv’s Park of Glory. Afterwards, Medvedev and Yanukovych did the same near the monument to the victims of mass famine in 1932-1933.
The ceremony was held under extremely unfavorable weather conditions: there was a very strong wind and it was pouring rain. Must have had all those dead souls howling at these two clowns trying to show their fake gestures, meanwhile not even acknowledging the Holodomor as a Genocide. The press service of the Ukrainian president asked the media not to post any videos or footage of the incident. Now that is what you call freedon of speech.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fz9yhWXDIDE

Click here for full story.

Source: Pravda

PS. We must not forget the great acting by Yanuk with the egg incident in Ivano-Frankivsk.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=fP0vWkqOQT8

Lviv museum recounts Soviet, Nazi atrocities

As Ukraine, Russia and Belarus elaborately commemorated the 65-year anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany on May 9, Lviv’s museum Prison on Lonckoho stands as a stark reminder of the other side of history – the terrors Soviet authorities unleashed on their own people, both during and after World War II.

Near the end of June 1941, as the German army began its offensive on Lviv and the ruling Soviets were in retreat, Ivan Kindrat and three other medical students scurried toward the city’s prison. It was commonly known as Number One.

An acquaintance who lived across the street from the penitentiary told them that on the night of June 28, 1941, he had heard gunshots and blood-curdling screams coming from there.

What Kindrat saw at the prison, which was run by the NKVD, the Soviet secret police, horrified him.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: Kyiv Post

Victory Day I would not call it!!!

As the Red Army advanced toward Berlin in 1945 it had become a city virtually without men. Out of a civilian population of 2,700,000, 2,000,000 were women. It is small wonder that the fear of sexual attack raced through the city like a plague. Doctors were besieged by patients seeking information on the quickest way to commit suicide, and poison was in great demand.

On March 24, 1945, these "noble Soviet allies" entered Danzig. A 50-year-old Danzig teacher reported that her niece, 15, was raped seven times, and her other niece, 22, was raped fifteen times. A Soviet officer told a group of women to seek safety in the Cathedral. Once they were securely locked inside, the beasts of Bolshevism entered, and ringing the bells and playing the organ, "celebrated" a foul orgy through the night, raping all the women, some more than thirty times. A Catholic pastor in Danzig declared, "They violated even eight-year-old girls and shot boys who tried to shield their mothers."

The greatest crimes against women in history, was the mass rape of the conquered women of Europe after the Communist victory in 1945. The rapists were mainly Red Army soldiers, some of them non-White troops from the Far East and Central Asian Republics of the Soviet Union.

Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin authorised his army to look on women as spoils of war. Hitler's war had cost 22 million Soviet civilians their lives, often in barbarous circumstances. But few could have foreseen the extent of the revenge.

At least 2 million German women are thought to have been raped. One doctor deduced that of about 100,000 women raped in Berlin, 10,000 died as a result, mostly from suicide. An estimated 10 per cent gave birth. The death rate was thought to have been much higher among the 1.4 million victims in East Prussia, Pomerania and Silesia.

Former Soviet war correspondent Natalya Gesse recalled: "The Russian soldiers were raping every German female from eight to 80... It was an army of rapists."

Below you have links to sources that show this sad part of history. While these robbers / rapists celebrate victory day with all their medals in Red Square, I would like to honor the true heroes, the women who survived this barbaric onslaught by the army of rapists.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_war_crimes


http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2002/may/01/news.features11

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1254521/German-victim-break-silence-Red-Army-rapists-65-years.html?ITO=1490

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106687768&ft=1&f=1004

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/3293251/Red-Army-troops-raped-even-Russian-women-as-they-freed-them-from-camps.html

http://www.rense.com/general19/redarmy.htm

http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/6-23-2002-20908.asp

Vladimir Putin, Raving Psychopath

Let’s be perfectly clear: The people of Ukraine do not want union with Russia. The only reason new President Victor Yanukovich even has power is that the opposition camp was divided between two rival, fractious candidates. The violent reaction in the Ukrainian parliament to Yanukovich’s announcement of the Sevastopol deal shows clearly that Ukrainians want no part of Russian domination. But such sentiments did not stop Adolf Hitler, and they won’t stop Vladimir Putin either.

It is up to the NATO allies to stop him. As Yulia Latynina’s most recent Moscow Times column, which we republish today, makes clear, the NATO allies are sending disturbing signals that they will repeat the mistakes of Munich. It is up to people of courage and good will in the NATO countries to make sure they do no such thing.

Click here for complete article.

Source: La Russophobe

Rare Russian opposition rally says Putin is Stalin

"Putin is Stalin! Putin is Brezhnev! Russia without Putin," chanted the crowd, including former chess master Garry Kasparov, one of the Kremlin's harshest critics who co-heads the democratic, pro-western Solidarity movement.

The opposition says Putin has stifled media freedom and democratic rights when he was president between 2000 and 2008.

They accuse Putin of blind economic policies -- similar to the years of stagnation under Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev -- as he continues to dominate Russian politics after handpicking successor Dmitry Medvedev and becoming prime minister under him.

Click here for complete article.

Source: Kyiv Post

New lows on the high road to democracy

And the Ukrainian clowns are back at it, adding more shame to an already shameful history. When will they learn to behave like human beings and not goons. Roman

Ukraine’s democracy proved as fragile on April 27 as the raw eggs that pelted Verkhovna Rada Speaker Volodymyr Lytvyn.

The crowd was nasty, clownish and thuggish inside parliament, among the nation’s 450 top lawmakers. But there were tense moments outside as well, among the estimated crowd of at least several thousand demonstrators. Most were from the opposition and tried to fight their way into parliament. But were easily repelled by platoons of police and helmeted Berkut riot-control officers.

Click here to read article as well as see the clowns at work.

Source: Kyiv Post

Also Montreal Gazette piece on this.

Protests as Ukraine backs Russian base extension - Kyiv Post
PROTESTERS hurled eggs in the Ukrainian parliament today in protest at a government deal to let Russia keep a naval base.

Ukrainian parli egging - video clip
Courtsey: The Sun

Scars linger as Ukraine marks 24 years since Chernobyl

Ukraine marks the 24th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster on Monday, but after nearly a quarter of a century the scars left by the catastrophic explosion are still plain to see. Read the story here.

Source: Deutsche Welle

You can also visit UKEMONDE Site for more on the Chornobyl tragedy.

Media watchdog: Ukraine's press freedom declines

Ukraine's press freedom has declined since the election of the new Russia-friendly president earlier this year, a global media rights watchdog said

The group expressed concern about Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych's decision earlier this month to disband the national commission on freedom of speech. It urged Yanukovych to explain his move and spell out his media policy.

The UNIAN news agency quoted Yanukovych's deputy chief of staff, Anna German, as saying Friday that the commission's functions were given to a newly created body that she heads.

Click here for complete article.

Source: AP

No civilized nation would erect monument to mass murderer

If the Communist Party wing in Zaporizhya gets its way, a monument will be erected to Soviet dictator Josef Stalin before Victory Day on May 9. Just as alarming, some government officials have no plans to stop them. Even stranger, some human rights activists agree. “It’s not the state’s business to interfere,” wrote a colleague from the Kharkiv Group for Human Rights. “What can the government do if it does not go against the law?”

Attitude to history is a good indicator of the capabilities and aspirations of the ruling elite. It rings especially true in Ukraine, which has none of the usual ideological reference points that allow the voters to make a distinction between the left, the right and the centrists.

We have to judge our politicians by their attitude to language, history and European values. If the rhetoric of the current government is of any significance, the near future holds nothing that would move us closer to a true Ukrainian state.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: Kyiv Post

NO Табачник (Another Brick in The Wall - Pink Floyd)

NO Табачник (Another Brick in The Wall - Pink Floyd)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hlo8aCO6yII

Dmytro [Krippinovych] Tabachnyk

Tabachnyk wrote in Duck Soup Ukrainian Style that the millions who protested in the Orange Revolution did so because of ‘neuro-linguistic programming’, a form of ‘psychological training’ that was developed by the Americans. This is not a case of seeing ‘pigs that can fly’ but of being a hardcore believer in UFO’s and little green men that fly around in space ships!
First Lady Yanukovych, who presumably is too busy in the ‘kitchen’ to perform her presidential duties, also claimed in her famous December 2004 speech that Orange Revolution protestors were drugged up from oranges injected with LSD (see the video clip of her fantastic performance http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oicOHnK9ihM). Maybe the First Lady heads up the Donetsk branch of the Ukraine’s X-files fan club and Tabachnyk the all-Ukrainian organization.
Picture above is of the infamous wife-poisoner Dr Crippen a very close resemblance to our Education Minister Tabachnyk. More on the doctor and his colourful associates here

Source: Taras Kuzio Blog
also Foreign Notes Blog

Nadvirna city council awards honorary citizen titles to Bandera, Shukhevych, Lenkavsky

March 25, 2010 | Interfax-Ukraine Ivano-Frankivsk, March 25 (Interfax-Ukraine) - The city council of Nadvirna in Ivano-Frankivsk region has awarded honorary citizen titles to Stepan Bandera and Stepan Lenkavsky, the leaders of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), and Roman Shukhevych, the commander of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army.

Interfax-Ukraine learned this at the city council, referring to a relevant decision taken on Thursday.

All 29 deputies who attended the session voted for the decision.

The council also supported Ivano-Frankivsk Regional Council's request to dismiss Dmytro Tabachnyk as Ukraine's education and science minister.

Nadvirna City Council includes 38 deputies who represent the factions of Our Ukraine Party, the Bloc of Yulia Tymoshenko, the Ukrainian People's Party, and the Congress of Ukrainian Nationalists.

Over 22,000 people live in Nadvirna.

Source: Kyiv Post

10,000 Ukrainians protest 'pro-Russian' minister

LVIV, Ukraine - About 10,000 protesters formed a human chain in the Ukrainian city of Lviv on Tuesday to demonstrate against a new education minister accused of being pro-Russian.


The mostly student protesters formed a human chain around four kilometres long in central Lviv, a city in western Ukraine considered a stronghold of Ukrainian nationalism, an AFP correspondent witnessed.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: Vancouver Sun

Yushchenko says Yanukovych has no legal muscle to cancel my Hero of Ukraine award to Bandera

Speaking March 23 to the 5-th Kanal TV, former Pres Yushchenko said Pres Yanukovych has no legal power to cancel the awards given by past presidents.

It is beyond Yanukovych’s legal powers to cancel my awards, like it was beyond my powers to cancel the awards given by all former presidents,” Yushchenko declared, saying the past awards are within the responsibility of the past presidents.“If Yanukovych cancels the awards] he will set a very dangerous precedent. What if a Communist president is elected after Yanukovych? He may cancel all decrees passed after the act on Ukraine’s independence in 1991,” Yushchenko argued. Click here to read more.

Source: Zik

Russian skater earns gold?????

Get over it you poor losers. There are more important issues your upside down country (Russia) needs, like feeding your poor!!!!

MOSCOW - Olympic figure skating silver medallist Evgeny Plushenko will get a "belated gold medal" from Siberian jewellers, Russian media reported on Wednesday.

Jewellers from Yakutsk said they planned to award a special medal weighing more than half a kilo of pure gold to Plushenko, who was controversially beaten into second place by American Evan Lysacek at last month’s Vancouver Olympics.

Most Russians, including Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, felt Plushenko should have won the gold in Vancouver. Putin sent Plushenko a telegram, saying: "Your silver is worth gold".

The 2006 Olympic champion himself said he was a victim of biased judging in Vancouver and felt he, not Lysacek, was the "true" champion.

Plushenko was forced to pull out of this week’s world championships in Turin with a knee injury.


Source: The Montreal Gazette

Yanukovych could lead Ukraine to West

Like Nixon and China. Analyst thinks hard-line leader is well-suited to create detente

Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, whose February election was greeted with deep skepticism by western observers and Canada's 1.2 million-strong diaspora, could end up bringing his country much closer to the West, according to a European political analyst and historian.

Yanukovych, known as ideologically rigid, socially awkward and politically corrupt, could end up emulating the policy breakthroughs of a politician who shared the same three characteristics - the late U.S. president Richard Nixon.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: Montreal Gazette

Take Zat!

The French have a head start with their conception of obnoxious Russians

Take Zat!

Russians are slightly up in arms about this French commercial. Wonder why?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_4NRvYnbco

Signatures being collected in Lviv in support of dismissal of education minister Tabachnyk

Ukraine The Lviv branch of the For Ukraine! Party has started to collect signatures in support of the dismissal of Education and Science Minister Dmytro Tabachnyk, the regional organization's press service has reported.

"Tabachnyk's appointment as education and science minister is destroying reforms in the education sector launched by [former Minister] Ivan Vakarchuk, and, first and foremost, the external independent assessment [of knowledge]. He will also try to review the assessment of history in textbooks. I think that the Ukrainian language will also be ousted from the sphere of education," branch leader Yaroslav Pitko said.

"He [the new minister] will harm our children through [his] absolutely different interpretation of historical events, and, consequently, their value. So we're demanding Tabachnyk's dismissal right now," he said.

The party's branch in Lviv called on Lviv city and regional councils to hold extraordinary sessions on this issue.

Source Kyiv Post

Bandera’s supporters ready for new battle

While there is no archival evidence to date that Bandera himself took part in pogroms against Jews, a brief alliance with the Nazis against the Red Army fueled Soviet propaganda which tainted him as a Nazi collaborator, and sparked widespread criticism of his movement by Jews. Supporters of Bandera see him as a hero, and are criticizing the European Parliament for siding with what they describe as a deliberate and anti-Ukrainian smear campaign.

Andriy Levus, who heads the service, said when the petition reaches 5,000 signatories, it will be presented to representatives of the European Parliament in Kyiv. The appeal has gained roughly 1,000 signatures a day since it was posted over the weekend and can be found on www.petition.org.ua/?action=view&id=251148.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: Kyiv Post

Taras Shevchenko

I wonder what Taras Shevchenko would think of seeing the yanachar Yanukovych standing in front of his monument laying a reaf? Rumors have it that the newly elected President will take part in cermony honoring Ukraine's greatest poet?

My thoughts, my melancholy thoughts,
My children, tender shoots!
I nursed you, brought you up -- and now
What shall I do with you? ...
Go to Ukraine, my homeless waifs!
Your way make to Ukraine
Along back roads like vagabonds,
But I'm doomed here to stay.

There you will find a heart that's true
And words of welcome kind,
There honesty, unvarnished truth
And, maybe, fame you'll find ...
So welcome them, my Motherland,
Ukraine, into your home!
Accept my guileless, simple brood
And take them for your own!

Yanuk called the distinguished Russian writer, Anton Chekhov, a Ukrainian poet. I cetainly hope he doesn't confuse Shevchenko being a great Russian poet.....
Never know what will pop out of his mouth. Let's hope he does not go about reciting any poems either.

You can read more about Ukraine's poet, painter, bard, hero, Taras Shevchenko here. Just as Stepan Bandera and the many freedom fighters of Ukraine.

Ukrainians have right to honor their own heroes

Here’s the actual text of point 13 of this resolution approved on Feb. 25 “[The European Parliament] deeply deplores the decision by the outgoing President of Ukraine, Victor Yushchenko, posthumously to award Stepan Bandera, a leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists which collaborated with Nazi Germany, the title of National Hero of Ukraine; hope, in this regard, that the new Ukrainian leadership will reconsider such decisions and will maintain its commitment to European values.”

But, at the same time, the deputies of the European Parliament – having no great knowledge of Ukrainian history – want to forbid us from having our own vision of our national past. The Russians are developing their own vision by creating a special federal committee. But at the same time, Ukrainians aren’t granted the right to have our own point of view. And if we do have it, it’s called fascism or Nazi collaboration.

E-mail the European Parliament and leave them your thoughts.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: Kyiv Post

Also check out Bandera Bashing Déjà vu

Bandera Bashing Déjà vu

We were down this road 25 years ago. Then it was the Canada’s Commission of Inquiry on War Criminals presided over by Justice Jules Deshcenes. Then it was the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Canada-based Nazi hunter Sol Littman who decided that “Ukrainians, by reason of their large numbers and historic hatred of Poles and Jews, proved themselves particularly pernicious [Nazi] collaborationists.” It was in this context that he proceeded to drag the Bandera family name through the mud.

Visit Stephan Bandera's blog to read more...

Thank you Stephane for your on going fight for truth and freedom from the communist propagandists, who's days are running out. Roman Golash

Source: Kyiv Scoop

Lviv City Council to approve address to European Parliament over hero title award for Bandera

Lviv City Council will hold an extraordinary meeting on March 3 to approve an address to the European Parliament concerning a resolution it passed deploring former Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko's decision to posthumously award Stepan Bandera, the leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, the title of Hero of Ukraine.

The council's presidium took the decision on Mar. 2.

Lviv City Council's deputies think that this clause of the resolution has no legal and historical substantiation and will demand that it be cancelled.

They said that while passing such a resolution, MEPs had been "misinformed by anti-Ukrainian forces" and had not known who Bandera was.

In this connection, the address will contain a detailed biographical reference about Bandera, which will be drafted by historians. Lviv City Council is planning to pass the copies of this reference to all MEPs.

As reported, the European Parliament, in its resolution passed on February 25, said that it "deeply deplores the decision by the outgoing President of Ukraine, Viktor Yuschenko, to posthumously award Stepan Bandera, a leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN), which collaborated with Nazi Germany, the title of 'National Hero of Ukraine.'" In this regard, the European Parliament expressed hope that "the new Ukrainian leadership will reconsider such decisions and will maintain its commitment to European values."

Source: Kyiv Post

Russia picks a Fight with Canada

As the second week of the Vancouver Olympiad wound down, the Canadian press was consumed with a February 19 op-ed in Pravda which offered nuggets of Russian wisdom such as “Vancouver is not fit to hold the Winter Olympics” and referring to ”the abject cruelty shown by Canadian soldiers in international conflicts” and calling the Canadians “retentive” and “cowardly.” Then this: “Canada lives in the shadow of its larger neighbour to the south.” Then he accused Canada of having an “inferiority complex, born of a trauma being the skinny and weakling bro to a beefy United States and a colonial outpost to the United Kingdom, whose Queen smiles happily from Canadian postage stamps.”

To speak about any Olympic host this way, much less a docile, self-effacing place like Canada, is the act of a true barbarian, and Russia has humiliated itself before the world by doing so. It richly deserves to have this outrageous abuse hurled back upon it if the Sochi games actually go forward, and we know that if it happens Russia will play the innocent victim in a way that will even more vulgar and appalling than its crude insults to Canada.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: La Russophobe

Ukraine takes losing in stride, unlike Russia at the Olympics

International sport during the Soviet period served as a way of proving the superiority of the Soviet system. The victories of individual athletes were the collective achievements of the Soviet ideology and the Soviet people. The collapse of the Soviet Union brought an end to the powerful system built over decades that helped to nurture top athletes, and the poor performances in Vancouver are in part a result of that decline.

It’s telling that while Russian politicians this month were still yearning for the sporting glories of the Soviet Union, their Ukrainian counterparts barely gave as much as a nod to the winter Olympics, busy playing a completely different game.

Click here to read full story.

Source: Kyiv Post

PS Could not resist adding the photo again, especially on a Monday.....

Olympian food: Pass the perogies, please

Ukrainian House at 3150 Ash at the Ukrainian Catholic Centre. I don’t know if it’s even orbiting at this distance but you can get there on Canada Line. Hop off at Broadway/City Hall and it’s a 10-minute walk.

At the Olympic Ukrainian House, it’s a different ball game. The food is a narrow stereotype of Ukrainian cuisine (similar to the first-Friday-of-the-month Ukrainian supper deal at the Ukrainian Holy Trinity Orthodox Church at 154 East 10th Ave.), but it’s a bargain. An overflow plate of perogies, slices of kielbasa, one cabbage roll (the weakest part of the dish) and a big whack of coleslaw costs $11.

Read complete article here.

Source: The Vancouver Sun

Plushenko a contender for worst Olympics loser

It’s like any other village – full of honest burghers, a few catty fishwives and the odd idiot.

If anyone has earned the dunce’s cap inside Vancouver’s Olympic village, it’s Russian figure skater Evgeni Plushenko. His antics since failing to win a gold medal have launched Plushenko into the pantheon of poor Olympic sports, where he sadly has a fair bit of competition.

Plushenko’s crimes against dignity? First up, his hair. But that’s his stylist’s fault.
The Russian takes the blame for everything else. After falling to American Evan Lysacek on Friday, Plushenko wrapped himself in a blistering air of ill will.

Click here for complete story

Source: Toronto Star

Whining Russians

Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin was not to be outdone in the whining competition. He sent Plushenko a telegram — A telegram? No wonder they lost the Cold War — in which Putin, in his new, self-appointed role as Supreme Olympian, informed his soured countryman that his silver medal was “as good as gold” because Plushenko had “performed the most accomplished program on the Vancouver ice.” Russian state media joined the parade, in tones that during the Andropov period had been reserved for denunciations of the warmongering arch-fiend Ronald Reagan.

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that this boorish behavior — to put it gently — has a lot to do with the fact that, as a political culture, Russia has never begun to come to grips with the legacy of 74 years of Communism. Lenin’s mummy — the ghastly relic of one of the 20th century’s greatest mass murderers — remains on display for the veneration of the obtuse and the confused in Red Square. Parades celebrating the birthday of Stalin, whose homicidal record topped Lenin’s, are not uncommon. The NKVD/KGB archives, briefly opened under Boris Yeltsin, are closed to researchers. Opposition journalists are murdered with impunity, while the state dominates the mass media. History is rewritten in order to mask, even deny, the horrors of the Gulag system (which, as Anne Applebaum demonstrated in her Pulitzer Prize–winning book, was not an accidental feature of Stalinism but an essential component of Stalinist “economics”).

Click here for complete article.

Source: National Review

Ukraine PM abandons poll challenge

A Ukrainian court has stopped considering a legal challenge to the result of February 7 presidential election after the prime minister decided to abandon her complaint.

Yulia Tymoshenko said on Saturday that she had decided to withdraw her attempt to overturn Victor Yanukovych's victory after losing confidence in the supreme administrative court.

"We do not see sense in further proceedings in the case," Tymoshenko told the court.

She later told reporters: "I faced a machine that works beyond justice."

"They want to sanctify the fraud and make it look legal."

After several hours of deliberations, Judge Olexander Nechitailo announced the court's decision to "leave the lawsuit by presidential candidate Yulia Tymoshenko without consideration".

Click here to read full article.

Source: Al Jazeera

Ukrainian court suspends presidential election results

A Ukrainian court said today it had suspended the results of this month's presidential election, pending a review of an appeal filed by the declared loser.

Ukraine's administrative court said in a statement that it has suspended the Central Election Commission's ruling announcing that Viktor Yanukovych won the election held on 7 February.

The results showed Yanukovych winning by 3.5 percentage points.

The court is to rule on the appeal from Yanukovych's rival, the prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, by next Thursday, which parliament has set as inauguration day for the new president.

Tymoshenko has refused to concede and is pressing to prove her claims of election fraud in court.

Source: Gaurdian

Ukrainians make Democracy look Bad

Poor people are capable of feats of bravery and revolution. They can storm the Bastille, overthrow the tsar or stage an Orange Revolution. But impoverished people are incapable of making sober decisions and voting responsibly in a popular election.

Click here to read full article.

Source: Moscow Times

Ukrainian president signs decree on recognition of UPA

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has signed a decree on the recognition of the ‘Ukrainian Rebel Army’ as a fighter for Ukraine’s independence, his press service reported on Friday.

The ‘Ukrainian Rebel Army’ (UPA) was created late in 1942 by a faction of the ‘Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists’ (OUN), headed by Stepan Bandera. UPA fought mostly against the Armia Krajowa of Poland, the Red Army and Soviet guerrilla fighters in Western Ukraine. The OUN-UPA men, whom people began to call the Bandera men, by the name of their leader, are guilty of numerous crimes. For example, they physically destroyed some 100,000 Poles, Czechs and Jews in the Western Volyn Region. Thousands of Ukrainians, who refused to cooperate with OUN, were also brutally murdered. For all those crimes, as well as for terrorist activities on the Polish territory before the war, Bandera is now regarded as a criminal and terrorist in Poland.

During the years of his presidency Yushchenko rehabilitated UPA veterans and conferred posthumously the title of Hero of Ukraine to UPA commander Roman Shukhevich and to OUN leader Stepan Bandera.

Source: ITAR-TASS

Yushchenko's move on nationalist embarrasses rivals

Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko, in a move likely to embarrass the two rivals fighting to succeed him, onJan. 22elevated a controversial wartime nationalist leader to the status of hero of Ukraine.

Yushchenko issued a decree conferring the honour on Stepan Bandera, the leader of the Ukrainian nationalist forces (OUN) which fought against both Nazi invaders and Soviet forces in World War Two and after.

Bandera continued to resist Soviet rule in Ukraine well into the 1950s. In the Soviet period he was the embodiment of anti-Sovietism and "bourgeois nationalism" and the very mention of his name was a post-war criminal offence in the Soviet Union.

He was assassinated in 1959 by a KGB agent in Munich.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: Kyiv Post

Stepan Bandera becomes Ukrainian hero

Ukrainian President Victor Yushchenko has conferred the rank of a Ukrainian hero to Stepan Bandera, the leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN).

The head of state said this during ceremonies marking Ukrainian Unity Day in Kyiv on Friday, Jan. 22.

"I decree to confer the rank of a Hero of Ukraine to Stepan Bandera and present a state order to him," Yushchenko said.

He said that the high rank had been conferred to Bandera for his "defending national ideas and battling for an independent Ukrainian state."

Bandera's grandson, also named Stepan, received the award from the president, an Interfax-Ukraine reporter said.

Source: Kyiv Post

Hat tip to Ukrainiana

Some oligarchs take sides, while others on sidelines

“Corruption, red tape, administrative obstacles of every kind – these are only things that serve the interests of those who today control the economy because they do not want competition. They are allergic to competition,” Jose Manuel Pinto Teixeira of Portugal told journalists on Nov. 30. “The vast majority of Ukrainians cannot have employment, cannot have decent salaries, do not have a decent social system, because the country today is in many aspects like 20 years ago.”
Teixeira’s comments came against a backdrop of the nation’s slow European integration and incomplete attempts to shed its Soviet past.
And it is hard to identify the “reformer” in this race.

Click here to read complete article.

Source: Kyiv Post

Yushchenko's place in history: A leader who failed his people?

Despite these initiatives Yushchenko lost virtually all credibility not only among Ukrainians but among Ukraine's loyal Russian citizens. Instead of arresting the rich and powerful guilty of rampant corruption, he gave them medals. Although this may have been motivated by a plan to co-opt former enemies and transform them into a "new national elite" nothing in the behavior of men like Kivalov ("seriozha pidrahui"), or Kyiv's mayor Chernovetsky suggests they have been thus transformed. Neither still can't even speak Ukrainian and historians will one day undoubtedly debate whether he, Batu Khan or Bogoliubsky did more to destroy Kyiv. Kyiv is turning into a vast filthy Calcutta-like slum.The initiative did, however, make a mockery of the awards system and the man who gave them.

Click here to read full article.

Source: Kyiv Post

International Center for Policy Studies: How to desovietize public administration in Ukraine

Ukraine’s political crisis is universally viewed as the only obstacle to the country’s integration into the European Union. Typically, only two main causes for the crisis are recognized: the “Ukrainian mentality” and a bad political leadership.
Click here for complete article.

Source: Kyiv Post

Ukrainian Christmas celebration in Montreal

Ukrainian Christmas celebration in Montreal presented by CTV news Montreal. Very nicely put together.

http://watch.ctv.ca/news/clip253103#clip253103

Veselych Sviat!!!

Source: CTV Montreal

Ukrainian Christmas 'not a generic holiday'

Wishing everybody celebrating Ukrainian Christmas smachnoyi kuti.
Click here to read article from The Standard in St. Catherines, Ontario.

Source: The Standard

Making a Little Fun of Russia’s Powerful

Ellen Barry writes from Moscow:It is not, from a purely technical standpoint, impossible to make fun of Vladimir V. Putin. His head is shaped a bit like a light bulb, with eyes that are heavy-lidded, as if to convey that he has just been reading your dossier. He has a needle nose, a prizefighter’s swagger and a fondness for posing shirtless. If all else fails, there is always the matter of height.

Read the story here.

Click here to view the clip, from great blog by Taras - Ukrainiana


Source: New York Times