UKRAINIAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE (UNK)

UKRAINIAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE (UNK) – an underground nationalist organization. It emerged in Lviv in 1956 on the initiative of young workers Bohdan Hrytsyna and Ivan Koval. The UNK began its active operations in 1958, by which time the organization already had at least 57 members, almost all of whom were young workers. The UNK’s program was more radical than that of the OUN: full national independence, a government composed of ethnic Ukrainians, the expulsion of non-Ukrainians from Ukraine, the creation of a national army, the liquidation of the collective farm system, and more. The organization was preparing for widespread agitation and intended to use legal methods, but it also planned to stage an armed uprising and was collecting weapons. At the time it was uncovered, it had a nearly complete printing press with type fonts.

The arrests began on July 19, 1959, and lasted for a month. Twenty members of the UNK were put on trial. By sentence, B. Hrytsyna and I. Koval were executed by firing squad; the death sentences for Volodymyr Gnot and Roman Hurnyi were commuted by the cassation court to 15 years of imprisonment. Pavlo Klymchak, Hnat Kuzyk, Hryhoriy Zelman, Mykola Melekh, Vasyl Soroka, and Myroslav Vovchyk were sentenced to 15 years; Oleksiy Zelman, Mykola Melnychuk, Vasyl Kindrat, Mykola Kurylo, and Oleksiy Tehlivets to 12 years; Oleksiy Menko, Mykola Mashtaler, and Omelian Khomyakevych to 10 years; and Anton Kaspryshyn to 5 years.