2005: THE YEAR IN REVIEW

Canada feels effects of Orange Revolution

For Ukrainian Canadians, the year 2005 still had an Orange glow. The wake of the Orange Revolution splashed over many events through the year - from academic panels discussing its effects, to awards to journalists who had covered it and to the Bloor West Village Festival parade, led by orange-clad election observers, who tried to revive the festive energy of Independence Square.

But, finally, the Orange wave retreated into memories and, when its first anniversary was marked in the Canadian Parliament, it officially became history. After a two-decades-long campaign by Ukrainians for acknowledgement and restitution, the issue of internment of Ukrainians during World War I was finally addressed by the government and given both legislative and budgetary attention. Finally, kudos to the tenacious Canadian Ukrainian for being successful in getting a public declaration from Canada's national newspaper that "Ukrainians are not Russians."

Former Canadian Prime Minister John Turner, who led the official contingent of 463 observers sent by CANADEM, the Canadian government-funded, Ottawa-based international peace and security organization to Ukraine, spoke at various venues about the role played by Canadians in the Ukrainian presidential election. He addressed nearly 1,000 guests who attended a dinner, organized by the Ukrainian Canadian Congress in Toronto and he referred to the recent events in Ukraine at the Manitoba Historical Society's annual dinner in Winnipeg marking the 190th birthday celebration of Canada's first Prime Minister, Sir John A. Macdonald.

Mr. Turner said that the friendship between Canada and Ukraine was "enhanced in a remarkable way" through the interest shown by Canadians in "sponsoring democracy" in a country he hopes has now begun "a new era."

Member of Parliament Borys Wrzesnewskyj attended the inauguration of President Viktor Yushchenko. Mr. Wrzesnewskyj was among the group of 40 heads of state invited to the inauguration ceremony on January 23 and the reception that followed. Mr. Wrzesnewskyj also met with most of the soon-to-be-named Cabinet ministers, and discussed the general state of Canada-Ukraine relations with newly appointed Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko and President Yushchenko.

Governor General Adrienne Clarkson, who officially represented Canada at the inauguration, sat next to President Yushchenko's wife at his swearing-in ceremony and next to the president at his inaugural lunch.

On January 24, Toronto's St. Vladimir's Institute organized a public forum titled "Ukraine's Orange Revolution: An Expert Assessment of the 2004 Presidential Elections." Chaired by Prof. Frank Sysyn, the forum featured four panelists.

Prof. Olga Andriewsky, Trent University, said she disagreed with the image of a deeply divided Ukraine that became a cornerstone of analysis in the West. "It's a stereotype that's absolutely wrong but was repeated nonetheless: a Catholic, pro-Western, Ukrainian-speaking western Ukraine on the one hand, and a pro-Russian, Orthodox, Russian-speaking eastern Ukraine, on the other." She expressed doubt about whether regional differences in Ukraine, which do exist, have actually consolidated into any kind of political identity.

Danylo Bilak was in Ukraine as an observer for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and saw the election result as a vote on values. "It's a choice of a set of values that Ukrainians believe they share with the rest of Europe - liberal democratic rather than Asiatic authoritarian values. Fifty-two percent of Ukrainians chose the European values, but 44 percent did not. The national unity issue revolves about how to reconcile these competing values, and managing this will be President Yushchenko's greatest challenge," he said.

Graduate student Alesia Kachur described the role of students in the Orange Revolution, particularly the student organization Pora, which began organizing long before the opposition cried foul over the presidential elections.

Correspondent Mark MacKinnon of The Globe and Mail was the only Canadian journalist who was stationed in Ukraine throughout the election events. He described the difficult situation of foreign correspondents with respect to stories in "countries of second importance" but agreed that the presidential election in Ukraine was one of the top stories of the year.

On January 21, a workshop titled "Ukrainian Presidential Elections of 2004 in Comparative Perspective" at the University of Toronto featured four academic participants and was attended by over 130 persons. Mr. Bilak, senior advisor to the government of Ukraine from 1995 to 2002, served as commentator for the presentations.

Prof. Taras Kuzio, George Washington University, titled his talk "Ukraine is not Russia" and focused on the mistaken assumptions and wrong tactics of the Russian advisors to the Leonid Kuchma government and the Viktor Yanukovych campaign. Thanks to the Orange Revolution, the fact that Ukraine is not Russia is finally getting through to the world, even to the Western media, he concluded.

Prof. Marta Dyczok, University of Western Ontario, focused on the power of television in shaping the events around the election. The fact that the cable Channel 5 was able to broadcast real news about the events on Independence Square was important in finally breaking the back of censorship. Many people saw the lifting of censorship as a sign of the end of the old regime.

Prof. Paul D'Anieri, University of Kansas, stressed the institutional changes that Ukraine is undergoing, partly as a result of the Orange Revolution and partly as a result of other changes that were already under way, i.e., shifts to a parliamentary system, a fully proportional electoral system and an imperative mandate. Those three changes are making Ukrainian politics similar to an idealized norm of Western European politics, he said.

Prof. Michael McFaul, Stanford University, called the Orange Revolution "the event of the decade" and pointed out that one of the key common features with Serbia in 2000 and Georgia in 2003 was "the breakthrough democratic election." He claimed that Russia does not have the characteristics needed for a popular revolution such as Ukraine's.

At the beginning of the year, two types of wine from the famous Crimean Massandra winery, a sherry and a port, appeared on the shelves of Manitoba liquor stores with labels bearing the famous photograph of the sitting Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin posing at the 1945 Yalta conference. Complaints from Winnipeg residents against the image of Stalin on the labels was taken up by the Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Association. "It's time we came to recognize that the Stalinist dictatorship was responsible for more suffering than any other regime in 20th century Europe. Ukrainians have just recently, with their Orange Revolution, rejected the legacy of communism. We don't want Stalin exalted here in Canada, even if only on a wine label," said Dr. Lubomyr Luciuk of the UCCLA.

Responding to the complaints, the Manitoba Liquor Control Commission announced on February 9 that it would immediately begin removing from its shelves the Crimean wines bearing an image of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.

On January 28, just five days after President Viktor Yushchenko's inauguration, the 53-year-old Ukrainian section of Radio Canada International stopped broadcasting its 30-minute Ukrainian program seven days a week at 7 p.m. Ukrainian time. The estimated audience of more than 2 million Ukrainian listeners will now only get to hear RCI's Ukrainian service for a half-hour on Saturday and for the same amount of time on Sunday. Furthermore, the Ukrainian programs will no longer be on short wave and Ukrainians will have to rely on either catching the RCI Ukrainian service over the Internet or on cable in major cities.

Wojtek Gwiazda, 25-year veteran RCI announcer-producer, who also served as spokesman for the RCI Action Committee, said there is a basic lack of understanding of the concept of international broadcasting at RCI. During the 1990s, the Ukrainian program had as many as five staff members and a 60-minute daily time slot compared to its current two staff members and 60 minutes of programming per week.

In a February 7 letter to the Rev. Ihor Kutash, president of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress Quebec Council, Robert Rabinovitch, president of the CBC and its French-language public broadcasting counterpart, Radio-Canada, which oversees RCI, said the decision to reduce the Ukrainian service's schedule was "final."

In an interview, Mykola Maimeskul, who had been appointed Ukraine's ambassador to Canada by President Leonid Kuchma back in March 2004, said that he has known Viktor Yushchenko for over a decade. When asked whether he ever thought that Mr. Yushchenko would become Ukraine's president, the Odesa-born ambassador answered "A few years ago, possibly not. But in the last two years, yes." The ambassador explained that he changed his opinion as he watched Ukraine's opposition parties, including Mr. Yushchenko's Our Ukraine, gain momentum and because of Mr. Yushchenko's passion.

For a few tense weeks between the second round of voting in the presidential election on November 21 and the Supreme Court-ordered repeat second-round vote on December 26, Ambassador Maimeskul was in a "difficult situation," as he put it. More than 500 Ukrainian diplomats stationed around the world signed an "open declaration" to "protest against what has become the transformation of the presidential elections of 2004 into a disgraceful war against the people of Ukraine." At least four diplomats from the Embassy of Ukraine in Washington signed the statement, as did three from the Ukrainian Consulate General in Toronto and four from the Embassy in Ottawa. Mr. Maimeskul was not among them. Now, Mr. Maimeskul is working with Canadian government officials to make Mr. Yushchenko's first official visit to Canada as Ukraine's president a reality.

The Canada-Ukraine Parliamentary Friendship Group, which has approximately 40 parliamentarians from all parties, representing all regions of the country, joining together in the interest of promoting relations between Canada and Ukraine, elected a new executive on March 22. It includes: Mr. Wrzesnewskyj, chair; MP Walt Lastewka, vice-chair; MP Inky Mark, vice-chair; Sen. Raynell Andreychuk, vice-chair; Sen. Consiglio Di Nino, treasurer; MP Eleni Bakopanos, secretary; Sen. Jerry Grafstein, MP Judy Wasylycia-Leis, MP Bernard Bigras, MP Peter Goldring, MP Joy Smith and MP David Kilgour, directors.

On April 19 the federal government unveiled its "white paper" on foreign policy - the International Policy Statement (IPS). The IPS sets out a new framework to make Official Development Assistance (ODA) more effective by targeting Canadian efforts and resources to key countries and key sectors within these countries. Under the new IPS, the government of Canada will focus bilateral development programming on 25 "Development Partners." Ukraine is the only European country to make the list of "Development Partners."

The new international plan also focuses on five sectors: good governance, private-sector development, environmental sustainability, health and basic education. Canada Corps, the mechanism by which 500 Canadian government sponsored election observers were provided during the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, will continue to play a key role in developing partnerships between government, civil society and the private sector.

Ukrainian products were winners at the prestigious Toronto Wine and Cheese Show held in April. Lvivske lager beer won the gold medal for best European-style lager, while Slavutych won a bronze medal in the same category. Krimsekt semi-dry sparkling wine won the bronze for sweet sparkling wine. John Vellinga, CEO of Multiculture Bevco (the Canadian distributor for all three products) said, "It is our mission to bring the best of Ukraine to the rest of the world. This proves that not only are we bringing the best of Ukraine, but that the best of Ukraine is also the best in the world."

Prime Minister Paul Martin and MPs Wrzesnewskyj and Lastewka welcomed 28 Ukrainian university students from Ukraine participating in the Canada-Ukraine Parliamentary Program (CUPP) to Canada's Parliament. The university students began their internship with parliamentarians in May. This year marks the 15th anniversary of the establishment of the CUPP. Under the direction of the president of the Chair of Ukrainian Studies Foundation, Ihor W. Bardyn, the CUPP has provided Ukrainian university students from Ukraine with an exceptional opportunity to learn how democracy functions in Canada by working closely with Canadian MPs of all parties.

An enthusiastic supporter of CUPP, Mr. Wrzesnewskyj and his family foundation Dopomoha Ukraini/Aid Ukraine, had recently donated $15,000 to the Chair of Ukrainian Studies Foundation to help bring the 28 Ukrainian students to Canada.

The Ukrainian Canadian Research and Documentation Center (UCRDC) is preparing to publish a selection of its video and audio taped interviews in a book titled "The Ukrainian Woman in World War II." Natalia Fedorowych, a lecturer in sociology at the Pedagogical College at the National University in Lviv and an oral history researcher, spent four months in Toronto as a CIUS Kolasky Fellow, preparing the selected material for publication. The book is being edited by Iroida Wynnyckyj, archivist at the UCRDC.

The source material consists of 50 interviews with women, born in Ukraine between 1893 and 1941, who were witnesses and/or participants in events leading up to and during the second world war, as well as in events that were consequences of the war. The interviews were conducted in the period 1979-2004 in Ukraine, Poland, Canada, the United States and Australia.

On June 7 the Legion Charter of the Royal Canadian Legion Branch 360 in Toronto, which has always been known as the "Ukrainian Legion," was abruptly suspended and the Branch premises closed by the Legion Ontario Command. Named after Filip Konowal, a World War I veteran, and the only Ukrainian Canadian to have been awarded the Victoria Cross, Branch 360 has played a unique role in commemorating the achievements of Ukrainians in the Canadian armed forces.

It was responsible for the placing of four trilingual plaques commemorating Konowal across Canada, a statue in his home village of Kutkivichi, Ukraine, and for financing the publication of a trilingual booklet about Konowal's life and times. More recently, the branch negotiated permission for a plaque to be unveiled on August 22, near Lens, France, just beyond Vimy Ridge, where Konowal's valor in battle earned him his VC. The branch sponsored a plaque at 218 Sussex Gardens in London, England, which served as a "home away from home" to hundreds of Ukrainian Canadian servicemen sent overseas during World War II.

Ukrainian Canadian veterans set up Branch 360 in 1946, bought the Queen Street property by pooling their resources and established by-laws that gave their branch a particularly Ukrainian Canadian mandate. Although recently the premises of the branch have been mainly used for "Club 360," a bar and lounge frequented by the hip Queen Street West crowd, the seizure of the assets of the branch by the Ontario Command has left many questions unanswered. The executive of Branch 360 is in the process of appealing the closure.

Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs Pierre Pettigrew named Abina Dann as Canada's new ambassador to Ukraine succeeding Ambassador Andrew Robinson. A graduate of McGill University (1974), with an M.A. in Canadian politics and international relations from Carleton University (1980), she was an international fellow at the Harvard University Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. She joined the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce in 1980 and served as trade commissioner in Sao Paulo, the Hague, New York and Mumbai.

In Ottawa Ms. Dann served in the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT) as deputy director of the Media Relations Office, director of the Foreign Policy Communications Division and director for communications and media for the 2001 Summit of the Americas. More recently, Ms. Dann was director of the DFAIT's European Business Development and Connectivity Division.

On August 31, in Edmonton, Governor-General Clarkson bestowed a Certificate of Commendation on the UCC for its role in organizing the mission involving 500 observers for the presidential election in Ukraine. The commendation read, in part, "The effort undertaken by the Ukrainian Canadian Congress to raise funds, recruit observers, and mobilize and train the participants was unprecedented and is testament to the energy, dedication, and ideals of all those who took part in the mission."

UCC President Irene (Orysia) Sushko stated that, "The UCC is deeply honored to be recognized by Her Excellency for its efforts in assuring that the presidential elections in Ukraine were fair and transparent and reflected the will of the Ukrainian people."

Mr. MacKinnon of The Globe and Mail, Canada's national newspaper, became the first recipient of the new John Syrnick Award for Journalism, sponsored by the Ukrainian Canadian Foundation of Taras Shevchenko, for his coverage of the Orange Revolution. Mr. MacKinnon wrote a letter of thanks to the presenters: "It is an honor to receive this award but it is an unnecessary honor as never before have I enjoyed my job as much as I did covering the happenings in Ukraine during the country's incredible fall and winter ... Ukraine, for a brilliant but too brief moment, grabbed the attention of the world's news media." The award was accepted on August 24 by Stephen Northfield, foreign editor of The Globe and Mail, on behalf of Mr. MacKinnon, who was on assignment in the Gaza Strip.

Named for John Syrnick, an influential editor (1947-1970) of Ukrainian Voice, Canada's oldest Ukrainian newspaper, the John Syrnick Award for Journalism recognizes the pivotal influence of media in presenting to all Canadians information on issues important to the Ukrainian Canadian community and will be presented annually.

With the assistance of the Ukrainian Canadian Professional and Business Association of Calgary and other donors, the Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Association (UCCLA) published a collection of Soviet-era documents dealing with the causes and consequences of the 1932-1933 Famine in Soviet Ukraine, the Holodomor. Compiled and edited by Prof. Yuri Shapoval of Kyiv, translated by Marta D. Olynyk, and with a foreword by Dr. Luciuk, the 336-page book, "The Famine-Genocide of 1932-1933 in Ukraine" consists of 81 documents (mainly in Russian, some in Ukrainian) complemented by English-language annotations, a list of acronyms and an introductory essay (in English and Ukrainian).

On October 25 Mr. Wrzesnewskyj, MP from the Toronto riding of Etobicoke Center, presented a check in the amount of $70,000 to the Chair of Ukrainian Studies of the University of Ottawa on behalf of his family's Dopomoha Ukraini Foundation, to fund the chair's electronic newsletter, the Ukraine List (UKL).

During the Orange Revolution, UKL experienced phenomenal growth, reaching thousands of scholars, diplomats, international journalists, businesspeople, non-governmental organizations and community activists in over 40 countries.

The initial contribution of the foundation will support UKL, its network of research assistants and translators, as well as a project of web archives. This will enable UKL to strengthen its visibility internationally. The foundation is also underwriting an initiative aimed at developing a Center for Contemporary Archives on Ukraine.

"North American and European Aid to Ukraine" was the title of a two-part panel discussion held at the Center for European, Russian and Eurasian Studies at the University of Toronto on October 21. The first panel, titled "A Critical Assessment," was chaired by Prof. Andriewsky, Trent University.

Panelist Janina Wedel, George Mason School of Public Policy, is the author of the prize-winning and controversial book "Collision and Collusion: The Strange Case of Western Aid to Eastern Europe" and a social anthropologist. She aims to understand aid processes rather than the projects shaped by aid by looking at the agents of aid, the relationships formed between donors and recipients, and the effects of the relationships on aid outcomes. The critical aspect in her analysis of aid was the "disconnect" between East and West, forged by the Cold War and exacerbated by barriers of language, culture, distance and information. Her conclusion was that most foreign aid to the former Communist countries has been ill-planned, poorly executed and misdirected.

Prof. Alexandra Hrycak of Reed College was largely in agreement with Prof. Wedel's analysis and she focused on the role of aid in the creation of transnational networks, using women's issues as a specific example. Although there is a dense horizontal network in Ukraine of women's organizations, many aid-funded NGOs bypassed and ignored them and created vertical structures tied to international bodies rather than empowering grassroots organizations in Ukraine, she said.

Mr. Bilak's topic was technical assistance in Ukraine and he maintained that there were three main challenges for its further development: a need to build in accountability and decentralization in order to address the issue of corruption; to facilitate and help locally generated NGOs; to work with a government in Ukraine that is interested in output rather than having a "grab and run" attitude.

The second session had, as its subtitle, "Lessons Learned" and was chaired by Prof. Sysyn of the (CIUS).

Bruce Steen, country manager, Canadian International Development Agency, explained that under Canada's new International Policy Statement, CIDA has selected 25 developing countries as targets for aid, with Ukraine being the only European one among them. Ukraine is a development partner identified in the new policy for several reasons: it has seized upon reform initiatives, it is using aid effectively, and Canada is particularly well positioned to offer the needed expertise there. Aid to Ukraine will now focus on four main sectors: governance, health, private-sector development and environmental sustainability, he said.

Ruslana Wrzesnewskyj, president, Help Us Help the Children, said that, although her organization uses Canadian and American volunteers, her main "lesson learned" in Ukraine was the necessity to stick to the grassroots approach, to develop Ukrainian partners and provide them with a "train the trainer" program. Marta Baziuk of Winrock International gave, as her main "lesson learned," the advice that process matters. "There are no shortcuts to effective implementation of a program," she said.

Although the likelihood of an election call before the end of the year put all federal riding associations on the alert, the executive of the Etobicoke-Lakeshore Liberal Riding Association in Toronto was caught off guard when it learned late on Friday, November 25, that their member of Parliament, Jean Augustine, had resigned her seat and that Michael Ignatieff, Canadian-born Harvard professor, was to be parachuted in by the Liberal party as the sole, uncontested candidate in a surprise nomination meeting scheduled for December 1.

Two candidates - Marc Shwec, a bilingual engineer with an M.B.A. degree and president of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress Toronto Branch, and Ron Chyczij, president of the Etobicoke-Lakeshore Riding Association who is active in many Ukrainian community and volunteer projects - were able to prepare their application for nomination papers by the deadline but could not submit them as they were locked out at the Liberal Party Ontario headquarters. Mr. Ignatieff, who has not lived in Canada for 30 years, is considered by some members of the Ukrainian community to be a virulent Ukrainophobe based on what he wrote about Ukraine and Ukrainians in his 1993 book on nationalism, "Blood and Belonging."

The ninth annual Bloor West Village Ukrainian Festival took place on August 26-28. Over 400,000 people took part in the three-day Toronto street festival, where headliners included singer-songwriter Vika Vasilevych from Kyiv, contemporary violin virtuoso Vasyl Popadiuk, the Syzokryli dancers from New York, cabaret performances and popular groups such as the Kubasonics from Edmonton, Taran from Winnipeg and the Dunai band. The ever-popular Saturday morning parade featured Ukrainian Canadian groups and an increasingly multicultural presence of Chinese, Croatian and other ethnic groups, who marched alongside former Prime Minister and 2005 Festival Parade Marshall John Turner.

On the eve of Canada's Remembrance Day commemoration on November 11, Dr. Ihor Lossovsky, consul general of Ukraine in Toronto, invited veterans of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), the 1st Division of the Ukrainian National Army (as the Galicia Division is officially known), the Red Army, the Canadian Armed Forces, as well as members of the Sich Riflemen Organization to a joint dinner and viewing of Slavko Nowytski's documentary film "Between Hitler and Stalin - Ukraine in World War II," made by the Ukrainian Canadian Research and Documentation Center (UCRDC).

Consul General Lossovsky said the aim of the event was to hold a "first in Canada gathering-reconciliation of veterans of the most horrific war in the history of Ukraine." Davyd Modylevsky, president of the Veterans of the Red Army club in Toronto, who was the organizer of the Soviet veterans' group that came to the dinner, agreed to maintain a relationship with the UCRDC by helping the center, which holds an archive of oral testimony of persons involved in World War II events, to obtain interviews with club members. UCRDC archivist Iroida Wynnyckyj immediately made arrangements for such interviews with several of the Soviet veterans present.

On November 6 the Ukrainian Canadian community of Saskatchewan, under the auspices of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress - Saskatchewan Provincial Council (UCC-SPC), celebrated the accomplishments of some of its notable citizens by awarding the 2005 Nation Builder Awards to Mike Boychuk (posthumously), a Saskatoon businessman and construction contractor; Stefan Franko, a community leader and benefactor who played a major role in the Ukrainian Self-Reliance movement and the Ukrainian Canadian Congress; Ehor Gauk, a pediatric neurologist who has visited Ukraine on numerous occasions dealing with the aftermath of the Chornobyl disaster; Jennie Ortynsky, a registered nurse and president of the Ukrainian Museum of Canada; and Anastasia Zuck (posthumously), a teacher and pioneering leader with the Ukrainian Catholic Women's League of Canada.

The UCC-SPC also awarded the newly established Community Recognition Awards to Patrice Detz, specialist in Ukrainian costuming and history; Shawna Lee Kozun, dance instructor; Stacey Nahachewsky, an aspiring Olympian in canoeing-kayaking; Theresa Sokyrka, singer and finalist in the "Canadian Idol" competition; and Yaroslaw Sywanyk for volunteerism.

On November 4 sculptor Leo Mol cut the ribbon officially opening the new offices of the Shevchenko Foundation in Winnipeg. The creation of the Ukrainian Canadian Foundation of Taras Shevchenko was formalized by an Act of Parliament in 1963 and its initial grant in 1964-1965 was $400. Today the Shevchenko Foundation provides over $300,000 yearly for the preservation and promotion of the Ukrainian Canadian cultural heritage and the advancement of a flourishing Ukrainian community.

The opening ceremonies concluded with an address by President Andrew Hladyshevsky, who expressed his deep appreciation to Ben Wasylyshen for the architectural interior design and Mike Kuzyk of Sparkus Construction for creating space for the foundation. The new office reflects and showcases the work of the foundation, and the new home is truly a space of which the Ukrainian community can be proud, Mr. Hladyshevsky said.

After two decades of lobbying by the Ukrainian community, the issue of the internment of Ukrainians as enemy aliens during World War I was finally addressed by the Canadian government. The Ukrainian Canadian Restitution Act, Bill C-331, first tabled in 2001 as a private member's bill by MP Mark, Conservative from Dauphin-Swan River-Marquette (Manitoba), calls for the federal government to acknowledge and provide restitution for Ukrainians who were interned in the years 1914-1920. On March 24, Bill C-331 passed its second reading in the House of Commons.

Bill C-331 was endorsed by groups representing Canada's Ukrainian community, and supported by the Conservative Party of Canada, the Bloc Québecois, the New Democratic Party, as well as some Liberal members of Parliament. After the second reading, the bill was sent to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage. On October 21 MP Mark testified before the Standing Committee. "Both the Ukrainian and the Chinese communities have been seeking recognition for over two decades in this country ... We are a multicultural society ... We need to fix our historical problems. These two issues are not currently part of our Canadian history," he said. The Standing Committee drafted a report to the House for further debate and a vote at third reading.

Finally, after eight years of intense work, MP Mark realized his wish for Canada's Ukrainian community as Bill C-331 was passed by unanimous consent in the House of Commons on November 24 and in the Senate the following day, and became law when it received Royal Assent on November 25.

MP Mark was presented a special Lifetime Achievement Award by the Ukrainian community of Calgary, Alberta, at a banquet held on October 28. Acknowledging the leading role Mr. Mark had played in promoting the Ukrainian internment cause in Parliament, the award was inscribed with the following: "Ukrainian Canadian Professional and Business Association of Calgary Special Lifetime Achievement Award presented to Inky Mark, B.A., B. Ed., M.P. 'A True Nation Builder and Friend' 28 October 2005."

In the federal budget released on February 23, there was a $25 million (about $21 million U.S.) commitment over the next three years for redress issues "for commemorative and educational initiatives" directed to Canadian ethnocultural groups that carry "troubling memories ... as a result of events that occurred in Canadian history during times of war, or as a result of immigration policies of the day," which so far have been "unacknowledged." The amount allocated would have to be shared among several ethnic groups - including Canada's Ukrainian, Chinese, Italian, Indian, German and Jewish communities - all of which claim to have suffered some form of historic civil rights injustices.

On August 24 the government announced an agreement in principle with the Ukrainian community that would provide an initial payment of $2.5 million to the community for the purpose of commemoration and education. Provisions of the agreement included: an initial contribution of $2.5 million to the Ukrainian Canadian Foundation of Taras Shevchenko; coordination by the Shevchenko Foundation on the implementation of commemorative projects over the next three years; and commencement of work on proposals to help commemorate the Ukrainian historical experience, educate Canadians about the experience and the contributions the Ukrainian Canadian community has made to Canada.

The internment issue also had the attention of scholars. On March 31 Prof. Bohdan Kordan of the University of Saskatchewan delivered the 2005 Prof. Michael and Dr. Iraida Tarnawecky Distinguished Lecture titled "Canada's Enemy Aliens During World War I: The Predicament of Belonging" to over 150 people in St. Andrew's College. A total of 8,579 people of Ukrainian and Central European descent were interned in Canada in the years 1914-1920. The so-called enemy aliens were detained in 24 camps across Canada, most of them in Alberta and British Columbia, and forced to work on public works projects.

Dr. Kordan tried to answer the question: Why did Canada choose to intern civilians when the first world war broke out? The two main reasons, he said, were the imperial view of the Conservative government of the day - the view that people were ultimately loyal to the crown or leadership of the country they were born in, and hence, Ukrainians from the Austro-Hungarian empire were seen as still owing their first allegiance to the Austrian emperor. Secondly, there was an economic depression in Canada in the immediate pre-war period and immigrants, who were the first to lose their jobs, were seen to pose a threat to the established order.

On October 1 a trilingual commemorative plaque was unveiled in Fernie, British Columbia, for victims of internment at the site of one of 24 internment camps. About 250 local residents and guests from across the country were joined by MP Mark and Jim Abbot, MP for East Kootenay, at the unveiling ceremony.

For the last 19 years, the Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Association has worked to place commemorative plaques at all 24 such camps in Canada. "We are grateful that Prime Minister Paul Martin acknowledged this dark chapter in Canadian history ... However, we have yet to receive any money from the $2.5 million promised from the Acknowledgement, Commemoration and Education Fund, meaning that we continue to fund projects like this one at our own cost," said Dr. Luciuk, director of research for the UCCLA.

Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, January 15, 2006, No. 3, Vol. LXXIV

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