Recognition
According to Columbia University professor John Armstrong "If one takes into account the duration, geographical extent, and intensity of activity, the UPA very probably is the most important example of forceful resistance to an established Communist regime prior to the decade of fierce Afghan resistance beginning in 1979...the Hungarian revolution of 1956 was, of course, far more important, involving to some degree a population of nine million...however it lasted only a few weeks. In contrast, the more-or-less effective anti-Communist activity of the Ukrainian resistance forces lasted from mid-1944 until 1950".
On January 10, 2008 President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko submitted a draft law "On the official Status of Fighters for Ukraine’s Independence from the 1920s to the 1990s". Under the draft, persons who took part in political, guerrilla, underground and combat activities for the freedom and independence of Ukraine from 1920-1990 as part of the:
- Ukrainian Military Organization (UVO)
- Karpatska Sich
- OUN
- UPA
- Ukrainian Main Liberation Army,
as well as persons who assisted these organizations shall be recognized as war veterans.
In 2007, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) set up a special working group to study archive documents of the activity of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) in order to make public original sources.
Since 2006 the SBU has been actively involved in declassifying documents relating to the operations of Soviet security services and the history of liberation movement in Ukraine. The SBU Information Center provides an opportunity for scholars to get acquainted with electronic copies of archive documents. The documents are arranged by topics (1932-1933 Holodomor, OUN/UPA Activities, Repression in Ukraine, Movement of Dissident).
As of September 2009, Ukrainian schoolchildren will take a more extensive course of the history of the Holodomor and OUN and UPA fighters.
President Yushchenko took part in the celebration of the 67th anniversary of the UPA and the 65th of Ukrainian Supreme Liberation Council on October 14, 2009.
To commemorate National Unity Day, on January 22, 2010 President Yushchenko awarded Stepan Bandera the Hero of Ukraine honor posthumously. A district administrative court in Donetsk, Ukraine cancelled on April 2, 2010, the presidential decree granting the Hero of Ukraine title to Bandera. Lawyer Vladimir Olentsevych argued in a lawsuit that the title of Hero of Ukraine is the highest state award which is granted exclusively to citizens of Ukraine. Bandera was not a Ukrainian citizen, as he was killed in emigration in 1959 before the 1991 Act of Declaration of Independence of Ukraine.
Read more about this topic: Ukrainian Insurgent Army
Famous quotes containing the word recognition:
“Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. General recognition of this fact is shown in the proverbial phrase “It is the busiest man who has time to spare.””
—C. Northcote Parkinson (1909–1993)
“The person who designed a robot that could act and think as well as your four-year-old would deserve a Nobel Prize. But there is no public recognition for bringing up several truly human beings.”
—C. John Sommerville (20th century)
“Admiration. Our polite recognition of another’s resemblance to ourselves.”
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914)