Ukrainian Canadian community launches new initiative to support children in Ukraine

TORONTO – The COVID-19 Children’s Relief Initiative was launched on May 20 as an online appeal to provide support to children in Ukraine in need of basic supplies during the coronavirus pandemic.

Almost 100,000 children in Ukraine were living in government-run residential institutions or rehabilitation centers prior to the quarantine announced on March 11. In an effort to contain the spread of the coronavirus, approximately 50,000 children were sent home to their biological families, many of whom are unable to provide or care for them.

Online exhibit focuses on internment of Ukrainians during World War I

MONTREAL – The Canadian Centre for the Great War (CCGW), a non-profit organization, has launched an online exhibit, “Confined: Reflections on Internment in Canada during the First World War.”

The exhibit shows images from the internment operations in Canada during World War I that targeted, among other ethnic groups, Ukrainians, who were labeled as “enemy aliens.” The exhibit can be found on the center’s website, www.confined.greatwarcentre.com, with additional photos on its Facebook page, www.facebook.com/greatwarcentre/photos.

World remembers Genocide of Crimean Tatar people

KYIV – On May 18, Ukraine remembered the victims of Joseph Stalin’s genocidal deportation of the Crimean Tatar people from Crimea. On that day in 1944, the first trainloads of Crimean Tatars were forcibly resettled from the peninsula to Central Asia and Siberia. In total, about 200,000 people were deported via cattle cars by the Stalin regime. Thousands died en route, and tens of thousands more died due to the harsh conditions of exile.

In 2015, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine had declared May 18 as the annual Day of Remembrance of the Victims of the Crimean Tatar Genocide.

The Mejlis, the highest executive-representative body of the Crimean Tatars, called for raising the Crimean Tatar flag with a mourning ribbon and urged the public to light candles in their windows on the night of May 17-18.

Assessing a year of Zelenskyy and foreign policy developments

KYIV – While attention in Ukraine has remained focused on coping with the coronavirus pandemic and meeting the conditions to secure further financial support from the International Monetary Fund and others, there have also been some notable developments in the foreign policy sphere.

The occasion of the first anniversary of Volodymyr Zelenskyy assuming office as president has also encouraged both the president and the press to reflect on his performance in the area of external relations – and especially those concerning Russia. The president has provided his own thoughts on what has been achieved and where things stand.

Ukrainian government introduces adaptive lockdown until June 22

KYIV – The Cabinet of Ministers has approved a decision introducing an adaptive coronavirus lockdown until June 22, while the second stage of the easing of lockdown restrictions will begin on May 22, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said at a government meeting on May 20.

As part of the second phase of eased restrictions, it is planned that public transport, and urban and suburban land transport will be resumed. Authorities will permit sports competitions (limited to 100 people and without spectators) and the operation of hotels (though not hostels). At the same time, the operation of restaurants and swimming pools in hotels will continue to be banned.

2020, intended to be Putin’s triumph, becoming instead his Waterloo

This year was supposed to be the Kremlin’s “year of triumph,” one in which the life rule of Vladimir Putin would be confirmed, but instead, Liliya Shevtsova says, 2020 is rapidly becoming his Waterloo – a time when both he and his system have sailed into disaster.

All the plans he had only a few months ago must now be “thrown in the trash,” the Russian commentator says. The coronavirus pandemic has proved fatal “not only for the individual but also for his construction which was erected for another time”.

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U.S. on suffering of Crimean people

The acting U.S. ambassador to Kyiv, Kristina Kvien, has called on Russia to “stop its legacy of inflicting suffering on the people of Crimea,” as Ukraine commemorated the victims of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin’s mass deportation of Crimean Tatars from their homeland in 1944. The chargé d’affaires issued a video statement on Twitter on May 18, which since 2016 has been marked in Ukraine as the Day of Commemoration of Victims of the Genocide of the Crimean Tatars. The Crimean Tatars were deported en masse from the Black Sea peninsula in May 1944, after Stalin accused them of collaborating with Nazi Germany. Seventy years later, in March 2014, Russia seized Crimea after sending in troops and staging a referendum boycotted by many Crimean Tatars.

The E40 waterway: Economic and geopolitical implications for Ukraine and the region

On April 24, the Ukrainian Parliament adopted a first reading of the bill “On Inland Water Transport,” finally codifying important planned reforms pertaining to riverine transportation in Ukraine – in particular, on the Dnipro River (Mtu.gov.ua, April 24). This new law creates a framework regulating the functioning and development of domestic riverways as well as launches a liberalization of this sector. If the bill passes its second reading (following additional input from interested businesses – UNIAN, April 24), Ukraine will come into compliance with the obligations found in its Association Agreement with the European Union, at last opening its river transportation market to foreign companies, external investments and foreign-flagged ships (notably, including military vessels) (Rada.gov.ua, January 17).

Remembering the Genocide of the Crimean Tatar people

The Ukrainian World Congress released the following statement on May 18.

The Ukrainian World Congress (UWC) pays tribute to the innocent victims of the deportation of Crimean Tatar people in 1944 and supports the call of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar people to the United Nations to recognize it as an act of genocide of totalitarian Soviet regime.

Seventy-six years ago, on May 18, the Soviet authorities began the planned deportation of over 200,000 ethnic Crimean Tatars from Crimea. The majority of these victims were women, children and elderly people. Almost half of them perished during the forced deportation because of starvation, illnesses, torture and slave labor in exile in deserted parts of Central Asia. The material and spiritual heritage of Crimean Tatars in Crimea had been destroyed. Libraries, schools and mosques had been closed, thousands of historic names were changed.

UAYA cancels summer camps nationwide

NEW YORK – Given the health and safety concerns related to the COVID-19 pandemic, the National Executive Board of the Ukrainian American Youth Association (UAYA, which is also known by its Ukrainian acronym as CYM) said it had made the difficult decision to cancel in-person summer camps in Ellenville, N.Y. Summer camps are also canceled at other CYM campgrounds nationwide, including Beskyd in Baraboo, Wisc., Kholodnyi Yar in Fillmore, N.Y., and Khortytsia in Huntington, Ohio.

At every step of this decision, the UAYA National Executive Board and Camp Committee emphasized that they worked to keep the health, safety and enjoyment of campers and the community paramount.