KRAVCHENKO, VALERIY OLEKSIIOVYCH (b. January 2, 1946, in Begovat, Tashkent region, Uzbekistan)
Worker, dissident, human rights activist, public and political figure.
His father, Oleksiy Kuzmovych Kravchenko, born in 1909, was a police officer, and his mother, Hanna Kononivna Panchenko, born in 1916, was a nurse.
Due to his father's service transfers, the family lived in Tashkent for several years, where Valeriy started first grade. In 1964, he graduated from secondary school No. 13 in the city of Chirchiq, Tashkent region. He worked as a riveter-assembler at enterprise p/ya 116 in Tashkent.
In November 1965, he was conscripted for military service, which he performed at a border post in the Lviv region. After his demobilization in July 1968, he remained in Ukraine and worked in Kyiv as a lathe operator at the "Arsenal" factory until December 1980. During his service, he was the Komsomol organizer for his post and a member of the district Komsomol committee. At "Arsenal," he was the deputy Komsomol organizer for his workshop and, in 1969, became a candidate member of the CPSU. Soon, he saw the discrepancy between reality and official propaganda and began to critically assess communist totalitarianism. At the end of 1971, he wrote a letter to L.I. Brezhnev, in which he condemned the internal policies of the CPSU Central Committee and announced his resignation from the party. Conversations, persuasions, and threats lasted for several months but yielded no results: his party membership was terminated. Then, discriminatory measures began. As a highly qualified universal lathe operator of the 5th grade, he was assigned to primitive tasks, his quotas were inflated, and his wages were reduced. And he already had a family to support.
In March 1978, Kravchenko held a protest demonstration in front of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine with a poster that read, “No to the personality cult of L.I. Brezhnev! Stop the tyranny!” He was detained by the police. After a lengthy ideological "conversation," Kravchenko was released but warned that any similar actions in the future would result in imprisonment.
On December 5, 1980, Kravchenko held a second public protest demonstration. This time, it was in Moscow in front of the Spasskaya Tower of the Kremlin. He held a poster that read: “L.I. Brezhnev, you want my blood? Come, drink, you bloodsucker!” Before this, he had cut his hand. He was arrested but released after a few hours, given the opportunity to travel to Kyiv, and was arrested again on December 17. During a search, the manuscript of Kravchenko's book “The Road to Dissidence” was confiscated. Initially, Kravchenko was sent for a psychiatric evaluation, where he was held for about three months. He was declared sane, and on April 6, 1981, the Kyiv City Court, presided over by H.I. Zubets, sentenced him to 4 years of imprisonment under Articles 187-1 of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR (“distribution of slanderous fabrications that defame the Soviet state and social system”), 206 Part II of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR, and 206 Part 2 of the RSFSR (“hooliganism”), and 222 of the Criminal Code of the Ukrainian SSR (“illegal manufacturing of a cold weapon” – these were homemade knives found at his home during the search).
Kravchenko served his sentence in criminal camps in the Voroshylovhrad and Chernivtsi regions. He was released under administrative surveillance: he had to be at home from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., was not allowed to leave Kyiv, could not enter parks, cafes, or restaurants, and had to report to the police once a week. Police officers had the right to come to his home for inspections.
From December 1984 to July 1989, Kravchenko worked as a lathe operator at the “Leninska Kuznia” factory, as he was not rehired at “Arsenal.”
On October 5, 1988, by Resolution No. 167/88 of the Plenum of the Supreme Court of Ukraine, he was rehabilitated due to the absence of a crime. On July 25, 1989, he returned to "Arsenal." There, they tried to get rid of the "Rukh activist," so Kravchenko had to go through another court process, which he won on all counts, defending himself against the accusations of the head of the "Arsenal" legal department, Ms. Pashchenko.
Kravchenko participated in the creation of the People's Movement of Ukraine (Rukh) and later the Democratic Party of Ukraine (DemPU). At the II Congress of the DemPU in 1992, he was elected deputy chairman of the party and worked in this position professionally. From October 1, 1996, he was the chairman of the Kyiv regional organization of the DemPU. He worked as the deputy director for commercial affairs at the "Tesma" company in the town of Bucha, Kyiv region. He later became a private entrepreneur.
On March 18, 2002, Kravchenko created the Public Committee (later the Public Organization) "For the Rehabilitation of the 'First of May Two,'" which aimed to establish justice in Ukrainian society for former political prisoners—participants in the struggle against totalitarianism in Ukraine who had been denied rehabilitation due to the application of criminal articles based on fabricated charges. As the first in a series of falsified cases, the organization took up the case of H. MOSKALENKO and V. KUKSA, who had raised the national flag over the Kyiv Institute of National Economy on May 1, 1966 (they were incriminated for possession of a weapon, which is why the Supreme Court denied them full rehabilitation in 1994). Kravchenko organized numerous publications, rallies, and pickets, and in August–September 2005, he held a 20-day hunger strike in front of the Supreme Court of Ukraine.
Kravchenko writes as a publicist. He has two sons (Oleksiy, b. 1976, and Andriy, b. 1981). He lives in Kyiv.
Bibliography:
I.
Speech at the II All-Ukrainian Assembly of Rukh // Rusnachenko A.M. Probudzhennia: robitnychyi rukh na Ukraini v 1989-1993 rokakh (Awakening: The Workers' Movement in Ukraine in 1989-1993). Book 2: Documents and Materials. – Kyiv: "K.M. Academia" Publishing House. – 1995. – pp. 336-338.
Interview with V. Kravchenko on July 10 and 16, 1999. https://museum.khpg.org/1314290802
“Natsionalna ideia abo panuiucha ideolohiia” (“The National Idea or the Dominant Ideology”). – Chas, No. 7. – 2000. – February 25.
“Ukrainizatsiia yak reabilitatsiia” (“Ukrainization as Rehabilitation”). – Trudova Slava, No. 148 (10726). – 2001. – December 27.
“Za prapor voli pishly v nevoliu” (“For the Flag of Freedom, They Went into Captivity”). – Holos Ukrainy, No. 56 (3056). – 2003. – March 22.
“Iz dissidentov v ugolovniki” (“From Dissidents to Criminals”). – Vecherniye Vesti, No. 065 (965). – 2003. – May 6.
“Demokratychna partiia Ukrainy v 1966 rotsi” (“The Democratic Party of Ukraine in 1966”). – Information Bulletin of the Museum-Archive of Ukrainian Samvydav, No. 1 (9). – 2004. – March.
Syno-zhovtyi prapor nad Kyievom 1 travnia 1966 roku (The Blue-and-Yellow Flag over Kyiv on May 1, 1966). – Kyiv: Smoloskyp. – 2004. – 56 p.
“Pravo zhyty” (“The Right to Live”) // Ukraina moloda, No. 76 (2863). – 2006. – April 26. (About Y. Badzio and S. Kyrychenko) https://museum.khpg.org/1455464516
Valeriy Kravchenko. Doroga v dissidenty (The Road to Dissidence).– Kyiv: Yevshan-zillia, 2008. – 436 p.
II.
Visnyk represii v Ukraini (Herald of Repressions in Ukraine). Foreign Representation of the Ukrainian Helsinki Group. Ed. and comp. N. Svitlychna. – New York. 1980–1985. – 1984: 5-10.
Havrysh O. “Yak Valerii Kravchenko borovsia z Leonidom Brezhnievym” (“How Valeriy Kravchenko Fought Against Leonid Brezhnev”). – Vechirnii Kyiv, No. 61 (14425). – 1992. – March 27.
Tsyvirko M. “Nema heroiv u svoii vitchyzni” (“There Are No Heroes in One's Own Homeland”). – Vechirnii Kyiv, No. 132-133 (17318 -17319). – 2004. – August 21.
Ovsiienko V. “Prapor nad Kyievom” (“A Flag over Kyiv”). – Shliakh peremohy, No. 20 (2507). – 2002. – May 22.
Kryvenko O. “Holoduvannia bilia Verkhovnoho Sudu” (“Hunger Strike at the Supreme Court”). – Narodne slovo, No. 35. – 2005. – September.
“Sprava sovisti suspilstva” (“A Matter of Society's Conscience”). – Ukrainske slovo, No. 35 (3235). – 2005. – August 31 – September 6.
Tsyvirko M. “Dviika v istorii chy z istorii” (“A Pair in History or from History”). – Vechirnii Kyiv, No. 224 (17635). – 2005. – November 30.
Tsyvirko M. “Yanhol ne puskav do prirvy” (“An Angel Kept Him from the Abyss”) // Vechirnii Kyiv, No. 23 (17681), 2006. – February 8.
International Biographical Dictionary of Dissidents from Central and Eastern Europe and the Former USSR. Vol. 1. Ukraine. Part 1. – Kharkiv: Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group; “Prava Liudyny,” 2006. – pp. 347–350. https://museum.khpg.org/1184401700
Rukh oporu v Ukraini: 1960–1990. Entsyklopedychnyi dovidnyk (The Resistance Movement in Ukraine: 1960–1990. An Encyclopedic Guide) / Foreword by Osyp Zinkevych, Oles Obertas. – Kyiv: Smoloskyp, 2010. – pp. 346–347; 2nd ed.: 2012, – pp. 386–387.
Vasyl Ovsiienko, Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group. July 17, 2006. Last read on August 10, 2016.
