Zelenskyy has audience with Pope Francis

VATICAN CITY – President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and First Lady Olena Zelenska of Ukraine had an audience with Pope Francis at the Vatican on February 8.

The Ukrainian president stressed the important role that the Holy See could play in bringing peace to the Ukrainian land. “The main thing we talked about is peace. He even called me ‘president of peace’ – this is my image in Europe now,” Mr. Zelenskyy said after the audience.

According to Mr. Zelenskyy, it is important that the meeting with Pope Francis took place two months after the Paris summit held in the Normandy format and before the next scheduled meeting of the four countries – France, Germany, Ukraine and Russia – in Berlin.

Speech by the president of Ukraine at the Munich Security Conference

Following is the text of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s address at the Munich Security Conference on February 15. (Source: Presidential Office of Ukraine)

The Munich Conference is among the most important platforms for discussing global security issues. And I am grateful for the opportunity to speak here – this is important for me and my country. Especially in the context of the latest expert analysis. I am talking about this year’s annual Munich Security Report.

We have mixed emotions about it. On the one hand, I am frustrated, alongside 65 million Ukrainians worldwide, by the fact that the report contains only eight references to Ukraine.

Heavenly Hundred remembered in Washington

WASHINGTON – Leaders and members of Ukrainian American organizations, Churches and the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington came together once again on February 16 in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington for the annual honoring of the Heavenly Hundred who were killed six years ago in Kyiv while protesting Ukraine’s pro-Russian government of Viktor Yanukovych. Standing among those in front of the crowd holding the huge Ukrainian flag and addressing the importance of that historic event were Ukraine’s Ambassador Volodymyr Yelchenko, Nadia McConnell of the U.S.-Ukraine Foundation, Michael Sawkiw of the Ukrainian National Information Service, Maryna Baydyuk of United Help Ukraine and Nadiya Shaporynska of U.S. Ukrainian Activists. Also there to lead the crowd in prayers for the 100 victims of that historic conflict were the priests of the local parishes of the Ukrainian Catholic and Orthodox Churches.

UNA CELEBRATES 125 YEARS: A snapshot from history, 1915

Seen on this page are the top members of the UNA Supreme Assembly in 1915 as they appeared in the 1915 Almanac of the Ukrainian National Association.

A year earlier, the 1914 “Kalendar Ruskoho Narodnoho Soyuza v Amerytsi,” the almanac of what was then called the Ruthenian National Association, marked the 20th anniversary of the fraternal organization, which was founded on February 22, 1894, in Shamokin, Pa. It is interesting  to note that the 1914 almanac was written in the Latin alphabet. Much of the jubilee almanac was devoted to the history of the organization; and there is a list of 372 branches, beginning with Branch 1 of Shamokin, Pa., the St. Andrew Brotherhood. The almanac also included Ivan Franko’s poetic work “Naymyt” (The Hired Hand) and the lyrics to the “Hymn of American Ukrainians” by Vasyl Shchurat.

The UNA’s anniversary year

The Ukrainian National Association concluded its 125th anniversary celebrations in the place where they began last year: Shamokin, Pa., the birthplace of this largest and oldest Ukrainian fraternal association. The quasquicentennial – yes, that’s the word for 125th anniversary – encompassed a year’s worth of notable observances.

On February 22, 2019, a UNA delegation led by President/CEO Stefan Kaczaraj and COO/National Secretary Yuriy Symczyk traveled to Shamokin on the exact date the UNA was founded 125 years earlier. A proclamation presented by Shamokin Mayor John J. Brown and the City Council cited the historic significance of Shamokin “as the birthplace of the Ukrainian National Association – and the foundation of organized community life of Ukrainian Americans in the United States.” A front-page story about the proclamation’s presentation appeared in the local newspaper, The News-Item, the following day.

Feb. 25, 2010

Ten years ago, on February 25, 2010, Viktor Yanukovych was sworn in as Ukraine’s president, and his first steps and statements mirrored those of President Leonid Kuchma’s first presidential term (1994-1999).

Mr. Yanukovych selected Mr. Kuchma’s former secretary as head of his administration and demonstrated that in foreign policy he would revive the multi-vector approach of the Kuchma era; in economics, Mr. Yanukovych appealed to populism, focusing on increases in wages and pensions. 

Ukrainian World Congress strongly condemns “Twelve Steps” statement regarding Ukraine

The release below was sent by the Ukrainian World Congress on February 18.

The scandalous statement titled “Twelve Steps Toward Greater Security in Ukraine and the Euro-Atlantic Region,” released during the Munich Security Conference, prompted intense debate in Ukraine and beyond, and provoked fair criticism from Ukrainian and international experts and politicians.

This document is yet another attempt to distort reality and openly promotes the Russian position beginning with the opening words: the conflict “in and around Ukraine.” The Ukrainian World Congress (UWC) once again reminds that it was Russia that invaded Ukrainian Crimea and eastern Ukrainian lands. There is no “conflict in and around Ukraine” – there is a war that Russia is waging against Ukraine.

United Kingdom’s ambassador to U.N. on supporting Ukraine’s independence

Below are excerpts of the statement by Ambassador Karen Pierce, the United Kingdom’s permanent representative to the United Nations, at the Security Council’s February 18 briefing on Ukraine.

…Madam President, the Russian ambassador spoke at length about the failure of others in fulfilling their obligations under the Minsk agreements. His account was largely a falsehood, wrapped in a fiction inside a fairy tale. Rather than enumerate where we believe the Russian account is misleading, I will say simply that I endorse what the German representative said in laying out all those areas of the agreements that Russia has violated. Rather than reigning in its proxies in the non-government controlled areas of eastern Ukraine, Russia has furnished them with arms and personnel. Russia claims to act only in the interests of those Ukrainians living in those areas, but does nothing to ensure the safe delivery of international humanitarian aid so desperately needed by many of the communities there.

Bitter echoes of Stalin’s deportation in Russia’s persecution of Crimean Tatars

Two Crimean Tatar political prisoners – Osman Arifmemetov and Server Mustafayev – recently became laureates of the literary award “Krymsky Inzhir” (“Crimean Fig”), with Mr. Arifmemetov’s prize for a text poignantly titled “My Deportation.” The awards in Kyiv were handed out by Ukrainian filmmaker and former Kremlin political prisoner Oleh Sentsov, who was forced to pass them to the men’s representatives just as once his prizes were accepted by his cousin and lawyer while he remained imprisoned in Siberia.

As journalist Taras Ibragimov noted in an acceptance speech on Mr. Arifmemetov’s behalf, the award demonstrated that “Osman Arifmemetov is a journalist by vocation who has not ceased his work even after his arrest and imprisonment. Osman is a modern example of the dissident movement of Soviet times.”

5-year-old Maksym needs your help

Dear Editor:

Five-year-old Maksym Atamaniuk from Ivano-Frankivsk, Ukraine, will undergo selective dorsal rhizotomy surgery on March 16 in the U.S. Although born at 30 weeks and weighing 2.91 pounds, he is developing well, regardless of heart problems and spasticity to his lower extremities, which limited his ability to walk. Today, after intensive therapy and care in Ukraine, Maksym walks with the help of special crutches. However, to make greater strides, he needs this surgery, which is not performed in Ukraine or Europe. After careful review of his case, specialists at St. Louis Children’s Hospital in Missouri feel that Maksym is the ideal candidate for this surgery and expect the following improvements: spasticity will be permanently reduced, sitting and standing postures will improve, transitions between postures will be easier and faster, and balance and level of comfort will improve.