PROBLEMS AND PROSPECTS
The defense of political prisoners in the USSR is a relatively new endeavor, not only for us, Ukrainians, but for many other nationalities of the Soviet Union as well.
The primary problem that had to be resolved and clarified most distinctly was the essence of the matter: whether our defense efforts, whatever their nature, were helping or harming the prisoners.
The fear of harming the prisoners, of worsening their situation, very often paralyzed any attempts, initiative, and even discussion on this issue.
To be able to speak about the defense of Ukrainian political prisoners in the USSR, one must first, at least briefly, explain the anatomy of a Ukrainian political prisoner—to clarify who he is and why he has been imprisoned in recent times, from 1944 to 1976.
I. ANATOMY OF A UKRAINIAN POLITICAL PRISONER
Ukrainian political prisoners who have been held in prisons and concentration camps over the last thirty-two years can be divided into the following categories:
a) Participants in the anti-German, and later anti-Soviet, Ukrainian nationalist underground and armed struggle (OUN, UPA, “Defense of Ukraine,” UNRA, etc.).
b) The nationally conscious Ukrainian intelligentsia, youth, clergy, and workers who did not participate in the armed struggle, who did nothing illegal during or after the war that would contradict the Constitution of the UkrSSR or its Criminal Code, but who did take part in Ukrainian cultural life.
Distorted Soviet legislation and the post-war abuses of the NKVD authorities of that time merged both of these categories of Ukrainian political prisoners into one. Over the years, the distinctions between prisoners completely faded, and they all came to represent the typical Ukrainian political prisoner who, whether in liberation formations (OUN, UPA), in cultural and civic organizations, or even in military units (the “Galicia” Division, the Ukrainian National Army), fought or strove for independence in those fields they voluntarily chose for themselves, or into which the turbulent life of the war years had thrown them.
Approximately 90% of the prisoners who survived the years 1944–1967 (most prisoners perished) were amnestied in 1957. A large portion of them were rehabilitated, and only a very small percentage, in exchange for their release, agreed to cooperate with Soviet police organs.
The years 1957–1964 were a time of great trial for those who were not covered by the amnesty but remained in the camps and prisons, and from whom the Soviet authorities demanded statements of repentance, condemnation of their past and their friends, and cooperation with the KGB in exchange for release. Only a few individuals broke under the pressure, while the rest of the non-amnestied prisoners chose their national dignity and personal steadfastness, serving their full sentences of 20 to 25 years.
After a several-year hiatus (1957–1964), a new generation of Ukrainian political prisoners emerged. This new generation can, in turn, be divided into three main categories:
1) People of the older and middle generations who, after the 1957 amnesty and full rehabilitation, became re-engaged in the Ukrainian liberation movement or the Ukrainian semi-legal resistance movement (a typical example is Sviatoslav Karavansky) and were imprisoned again—either to serve out their first sentence or to be sentenced anew for their recent activities.
2) People of the younger generation who had no connection to the OUN and UPA liberation movement but who spontaneously created underground or semi-legal organizations themselves (e.g., the groups of Kandyba and Lukianenko, Hrytsyna).
3) People of the legal opposition—the Ukrainian resistance movement, predominantly from the intellectual and youth circles, who were born and raised under Soviet reality and who created Ukrainian samvydav, spoke out against Russification, and stood up for the repressed and against the abuses of Soviet power in Ukraine.
From memoirs, samvydav materials, and available information, one can conclude that by the late 1960s, the Soviet authorities made no distinction between members of the underground and the semi-legal resistance movement (opposition), prosecuting them all under the same Article 62 of the Criminal Code.
The new generation of political prisoners (from the trials of 1965–1966 and 1972–1973) consists of people with a completely different psychological and ideological makeup and a different attitude toward the existing Soviet reality in Ukraine. Almost no one from this new category of political prisoners, which has been joined by political prisoners from all other categories, takes a passive, conformist position. On the contrary, the stances of all current political prisoners are positively active, which is manifested in their constant demands, endless protests, frequent hunger strikes, and camp-based samvydav creative work that makes its way abroad.
Even in confinement, these political prisoners do not cease their struggle but continue it by all possible peaceful means, unlike the prisoners of the post-war years who organized uprisings (Norilsk, Kingir) and fought even with weapons in hand.
In addition to the foregoing, a fundamental and principled question of the morality of defense arises.
II. THE MORALITY OF DEFENDING UKRAINIAN POLITICAL PRISONERS
Many organizations and individuals involved in defense matters are often faced with the question of what defense offers a political prisoner, whether it harms or helps, and how the Soviet regime reacts to various defense actions. Defense affects a political prisoner’s life in two dimensions:
1) Defense as moral support.
Defense actions show the prisoner that he has not been forgotten in Ukraine and beyond its borders, that he has not been renounced, that he is remembered, and that he is not alone. The ideas for which he was imprisoned are acknowledged and disseminated by others, who win supporters and adherents for them.
2) Defense as practical support.
Today, the Soviet regime finds itself in a situation where it cannot ignore public opinion in the Western world. Under the pressure of this opinion, combined with the dignified stance of the political prisoners themselves and their families in Ukraine, it is forced to make certain concessions (the most telling examples: L. Plyushch was released to the West; V. Moroz and M. Rudenko were not committed to psychiatric prisons; I. Kalynets’s family was reimbursed for travel costs for a visit that was cancelled without the administration notifying the family).
If there was once room for debate about whether actions in defense of political prisoners helped or harmed, today this question is beyond discussion. And if that is the case, then it is necessary to explain very precisely what work and which actions can be encompassed by the word defense.
The question of what defense is can be answered as follows:
Defense is the organization of public opinion regarding prisoners through:
a. statements on their behalf by foreign organizations and prominent figures;
b. collecting signatures on petitions to international organizations and Soviet officials;
c. organizing peaceful demonstrations;
d. publishing informational materials about them in foreign languages;
e. publishing and disseminating their works and works about them in the foreign press;
f. writing letters and greetings to them on various occasions;
g. speaking in their defense and on their behalf at various international forums;
h. publishing articles about them and writing letters to foreign publications on their behalf;
i. efforts and measures to secure their membership in various international organizations (e.g., N. Strokata is the only member of the American Society for Microbiology from Ukraine);
j. active work in those international organizations and committees that are engaged in their defense (Amnesty International, for example).
This is approximately what the concept of defense entails, and it is what we must do, what our duty is.
When it comes to Ukrainian committees and organizations dealing with defense matters, we have two main categories of organizations, each with its own specifics:
A. First Category.
This category should include (chronologically):
1. “Smoloskyp – Organization for the Defense of Human Rights in Ukraine,” which was created immediately after the re-sentencing of V. Moroz in November 1970.
2. The Human Rights Commission of the WCFU, which began to more systematically address the defense of Ukrainian political prisoners, starting with the Second WCFU Congress (1972).
3. Committees for the Defense of V. Moroz or committees with different names but the same goals, which were established locally, starting in January 1974, at the initiative of CeSUS and some national student organizations, as well as with the help of local chapters of the UCCA and other organizations.
4. “Committee for the Defense of Soviet Political Prisoners,” created in April 1971, which, in addition to Ukrainians, also defends political prisoners of other nationalities from the USSR and Eastern European countries.
B. Second Category.
This category should include social, civic, women’s, youth, professional, religious, and scientific organizations, committees, and institutions that either initiated or assisted in the implementation of various defense actions.
As in all different plans, projects, and their implementation, there were both positives and negatives in the defense work.
The positives include:
1. Our community succeeded for the first time in reaching an international forum, overcoming the prejudices of foreign officials and their press, and proving that we can organize defense work no worse than, for example, the Jews. At the same time, of all the nations of the USSR, we were perhaps the only ones capable of large and successful actions.
2. In our entire history, it is only in recent years that we have achieved the greatest publicity for the Ukrainian cause and for Ukrainian political prisoners.
3. Various groups specifically engaged in the defense of political prisoners have prepared and distributed, according to a rough estimate, over one million informational publications—brochures and pamphlets—about Ukrainian political prisoners.
4. Through the efforts of young Ukrainian activists, editors, and translators, it was possible to publish in English two editions of Moroz’s works, the 7th-8th issue of the underground “Ukrainian Herald” under the title “Ethnocide of Ukrainians in the USSR,” the 6th issue of the “Ukrainian Herald,” M. Osadchy’s “Cataract” in French and English, and Y. Sverstiuk’s “A Cathedral in Scaffolding.”
5. Collecting approximately half a million signatures on various petitions in defense of Ukrainian political prisoners.
6. Participating in international conferences and meetings where the cases of Ukrainian political prisoners were discussed—the UN conference on colonialism in Norway; the UN conference for the International Women’s Year in Mexico; the Sakharov Hearings in Copenhagen; the UN Habitat Conference in Vancouver; the XXI Olympic Games in Montreal; and co-participation in various events in defense of political prisoners.
The negatives include:
1. To date, it has not been possible to create a coordinating body for all defense actions on a national scale, meaning it has not been possible to create a central hub for all defense committees within or outside the UCCA.
2. Various events and actions of a local nature were not coordinated with each other, synchronized, centralized, or jointly planned.
3. In the USA, UCCA chapters, individual organizations, and committees have insufficiently distributed works of Ukrainian samvydav in English in their localities (works by V. Moroz, “Ethnocide,” “Cataract”).
4. For defense actions and for the publication of Ukrainian samvydav works, with the exception of the National Board of the UNA, other civic, professional, and fraternal benefit organizations provided little or no financial assistance.
Having clarified the state of defense efforts and being convinced that the defense of Ukrainian political prisoners is not only needed but necessary, the following concrete proposals can be made.
1. Allocate 15% of the UCCA budget for the defense of Ukrainian political prisoners in the USSR, with a precise plan for distributing these funds for specific, highly specialized projects.
2. With financial assistance from the UCCA, convene a standing Conference of all active and interested defense committees and organizations for the following purposes:
a) to hold joint meetings semi-annually;
b) to plan defense actions on a national scale for a six-month period;
c) to coordinate individual actions in defense of political prisoners;
d) to coordinate the publication of informational materials about Ukrainian political prisoners and to mutually assist in their preparation;
e) to plan the distribution of Ukrainian samvydav works in English and informational materials about events in Ukraine.
3. Assemble a 3-5 member commission of objectively-minded professors from American institutions of higher education to review published or forthcoming English-language works of Ukrainian samvydav and to serve as a competent and decisive body to recommend their mass distribution among non-Ukrainians by UCCA chapters, defense committees, and civic organizations.
4. Immediately launch a defense campaign for two categories of Ukrainian political prisoners:
a) those illegally held in psychiatric prisons;
b) those who have been held for 20 years or more in prisons and concentration camps for their participation in the Ukrainian liberation movement.
5. Through the joint efforts of interested and competent organizations and private individuals, prepare a handbook for Ukrainians traveling to Ukraine with practical information regarding their dignified conduct in Ukraine and opportunities to engage in the defense of political prisoners and the Ukrainian cause during such trips.
6. Entrust the Commission for the Study of Contemporary Ukraine with organizing academic conferences in major Ukrainian settlements to discuss the reality in Ukraine and to more actively involve the Ukrainian community in the defense of Ukrainian political prisoners, in actions against the destruction of religion and religious and historical monuments in Ukraine, and in defense of the legal rights of the Ukrainian people.
7. Take appropriate measures with American government officials to ensure that Ukrainian refugees from Soviet Ukraine are directed to settle in this country within Ukrainian institutions, primarily the UUARC.
8. Obligate the new UCCA Executive Board to purchase an appropriate number of English-language works of Ukrainian samvydav for distribution among American political figures, foreign embassies, and UN missions in the USA.
Even the partial realization of these projects will be a testament to our national and state maturity and will engage our community, as a national factor conscious of its tasks, in concrete and very practical assistance to our people in Ukraine.
By implementing these projects, we will prove that behind our patriotic statements and declarations stand concrete and practical deeds, which are so needed in Ukraine today.
“Svoboda,” nos. 222, 223; November 16, 17, 1976.
From the publication: Zinkevych, Osyp. Diary. 1948–1949, 1967–1968, 1971–1976 / Osyp Zinkevych. – K.: Smoloskyp, 2016. – 504 pp. (pp. 418–428)
