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26.12.2012
70 years after the formation of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), special note was taken this year of this event throughout Ukraine and the Ukrainian global community to honor Ukraine’s heroes only very few still living, to mark this unique era in Ukrainian history and to revisit the significance of this struggle within the context of the Ukrainian nation’s quest for statehood achieved only some twenty years ago and more than thirty years after the last known UPA operation. The OUN-UPA is an often referred to singular term for the Ukrainian liberation struggle from 1929-50. From 1942 to 1950 these formations were inseparable. Without the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists there would not have been an UPA as we know it. The UPA was nationwide phenomenon. However, the core of its first squads consisted of members of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists. They were integral parts of one movement – The OUN”s structure even included an UPA Military Wing. A distinct... |
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06.10.2012
Bereza Kartuzka is a film about political prisoners during Western Ukraine’s inter War Polish regime. Its harshness spawned the Ukrainian Insurgent Army which went on to fight the Nazi and Soviet machines. Producer/Director Yurij Luhovy caps the universality of man's inhumanity to man with the message: resistance to tyranny is eternal. Bereza, named after the notorious prison, is about yesterday; its lessons are applicable today.
Many young faces on the screen are familiar. They became leaders: Taras Chuprynka founded an army; Stefan Bandera led an independence movement. There’s Winnipeg's Olha Bilas-Senchuk. She is crying, recalling her uncle and brother's execution by hanging for resisting oppression. Volodymyr Makar is there, Sofijka and Lesia Kachor's mother and Theodor Baran, whose son Emil was a strong Canadian presence in post-independent Ukraine. And handsome pan Majiwskyj. Shot by the enemy, his widow married Evhen Shtendera-- "Litopys UPA" fame--and taught hundreds of children in Ukrainian-language schools. Yaroslav Preyzhlak's commentary throughout the footage is invaluable just like his eulogy at... |
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10.09.2012
The cheers have subsided. The Euro 2012 football championship ended on Sunday night, and by all accounts co-hosts Poland and Ukraine acquitted themselves well. The stadiums were state of the art, the hospitality warm, the competition fierce and thrilling. In the words of UEFA President Michel Platini, the tournament was a 'fantastic' event certain to 'remain in our memories'. What a difference a month makes. At the beginning of June, Poland and Ukraine were rocked by accusations of anti-Semitism and racism in the BBC Panorama documentary 'Stadiums of Hate'. Shocking video of violence in Ukrainian football stands frightened away thousands of European fans and tourists. The situation was dire. Reporting from Donetsk in eastern Ukraine, one journalist on the BBC Breakfast programme even went so far as to ask, 'Are Ukrainians dangerous racists?'... |
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10.09.2012
The Ukrainian Canadian Congress expressed its dismay at yesterday's signing into law by Ukraine's President Viktor Yanukovych of making the Russian language an official language in parts of Ukraine. "The Ukrainian Canadian Congress considers the Draft Law on Principles of the State Language Policy to be a significant breach of the Constitution of Ukraine and a significant threat to the survival of the Ukrainian language in Ukraine," stated Ukrainian Canadian Congress National President Paul Grod. The Ukrainian Canadian Congress (UCC) denounced the signature of the law by President Yanukovych as a regressive step that will serve to harm the Ukrainian language and create further civil and political unrest in Ukraine... |
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10.08.2012
When Marcin Pietrzyk was driving back to Poland after a whirlwind trip that included watching England's 3-2 victory over Sweden in Kyiv, he felt a twinge of regret as the border approached. His car was still decorated with the Polish flag, as it had been throughout the trip. But he had been hoping to add a Ukraine flag to his collection, as a way to commemorate his first-ever trip to the neighboring country and fellow Euro 2012 co-host. Stopping for gas, Pietrzyk and his friends Jacek and Piotrek were approached by a Ukrainian who evidently had the same idea. The men exchanged flags and posed for a photograph... |
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10.08.2012
But just what does that history encompass? Less than a year into office, the government of President Viktor Yanukovych revised fifth-grade history textbooks to delete certain key events from Ukrainian history, including the 2004-05 Orange Revolution... |
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10.08.2012
Late January, Timothy Snyder - a Yale University history professor - packed auditoria and lecture halls at St Vladimir Institute in Toronto and the University of Toronto and spoke to an evenly distributed crowd from the Ukrainian, Polish and Jewish communities about his recent book, Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin. Kudos’ to the organizers... |
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10.08.2012
The book Arkhivna Ukrainika v Kanadi: Dovidnyk (Archival Ucrainica in Canada: A Guide) is an extensive (882 pp.) Ukrainian-language guide to Ukrainian and Ukrainian-Canadian holdings in Canadian archival repositories. It is the most comprehensive compilation of its kind and is unlikely to be superceded in the foreseeable future... |
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10.08.2012
The oldest known Iron-Age settlers in Ukraine were the nomadic Cimmerians who settled there around 10th century BC. In the 8th century BC, the territories of today's Ukraine came under the control of the Scythians, tribes of nomadic horsemen who founded an empire that stretched from the Danube River in the west to the Ural Mountains in the east. The Scythians were divided into several major tribal groups... |
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13.07.2012
Only a short time ago, nobody believed Ukraine could deliver on Euro 2012. In the event, Ukraine rose to the challenge and, together with Poland, hosted one of the most successful tournaments ever. Now Ukraine’s leadership must rise to another challenge. It must demonstrate in actions rather than words that it is committed to European integration, argues Amanda Paul... |
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