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Author Topic: Ukraine: anti-semitism and Yuschenko's party
thebabblerformerlyknownas'larry'
rabble-rouser
Babbler # 5043

posted 27 November 2004 06:30 PM      Profile for thebabblerformerlyknownas'larry'     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
The British Helsinki Human Rights Group challenges good vs. evil media portraits of Ukraine right now. I don't doubt that Yanukovic has still benifitted from fraud mind you, but this is very disturbing. I thought I would start a new thread for this since does not simply deal with the election.


quote:
A key media outlet which has backed Viktor Yushchenko’s long march on the Ukrainian presidency published an extraordinary anti-Semitic rant in 2003 which claimed that 400,000 Jews fought alongside Hitler’s invading army in 1941!

Inserted as an advertising feature, “Jews in Ukraine Today: Reality Without Myths," appeared in Silski visti (Village News). The newspaper was one of the largest in Ukraine with a circulation of around 500,000. It was a prominent backer of Viktor Yushchenko and his Our Ukraine party.
..In late 2003, Alexander Shlayen, the head of the Ukrainian Anti-Fascist Committee and a prominent member of the post-Holocaust Jewish community in Ukraine, initiated a prosecution of the newspaper, Silski visti for promoting inter-ethnic discord in the country which was the site of the infamous Babi Yar massacre along with countless other Nazi atrocities against Jews.

On 28th January, 2004, the court ordered the closing of the newspaper but it defied the ruling with the vocal backing of the opposition Our Ukraine party and its allies. In August, 2004, Alexander Shlaven died suddenly and unexpectedly
editor, Vasily Gruzin, defended the newspaper's decision to publish the piece:

"Although we published the Yaremenko article as a paid advertisement and not as a position we ourselves endorsed, I happen to believe the figure of 400,000 Jews taking part in the German invasion of the Ukraine is not far from the truth," he said.
"I personally have nothing against common Jews [edited to add: wait for it...] , but rather against a small group of Jewish oligarchs who control Ukraine both economically and politically. I believe the point of Zionism today is Jewish control of the world, and we see this process at work in Ukraine today."


Shortly after this anti-Semitic diatribe by Yaremenko, Victor Yuschenko – who our media always apostrophises as “the pro-Western presidential candidate” and who enjoys the open support of the Bush administration -- and another prominent opposition leader, energy oligarch Yulia Timoshenko and Alexander Moroz of the Socialist Party issued a statement headed "Hands Off Silski Visti”!

[http://www.ncsj.org/AuxPages/092104JTA_Ukraine.shtml]


quote:
In Ukraine, in the presidential elections, Soros’s people back Yushchenko but he is also supported by Andrei Shkil’s ultra-nationalist UNSO. Vyacheslav Likhachev of the European-Asian Jewish Congress noted the unsettling links between Mr Soros’s preferred candidate for Ukrainian president, Yuschchenko, and the neo-Nazis there after the 2002 parliamentary elections

“the former leader of the UNA-UNSD Andry Shkil was elected to the parliament in a single-ticket election in the Lviv region, with the support of Our Ukraine, led by Viktor Yuschenko (Victor Yuschenko is a former prime minister and one of the quite probable presidential candidates). At the time elections were held, the leader of the nationalists had been in jail for a year, accused of organizing mass anti-government riots. Having been elected, Andry Shkil was granted immunity to criminal prosecution. Thus, the moderate national-democrats form unions with the radicals.”


[ 27 November 2004: Message edited by: thebabblerformerlyknownas'larry' ]

[ 27 November 2004: Message edited by: thebabblerformerlyknownas'larry' ]


From: Kitchener, Ontario | Registered: Feb 2004  |  IP: Logged
Stockholm
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posted 27 November 2004 07:07 PM      Profile for Stockholm     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
I would not be surprised if there are unsavoury characters backing both of the candidates in Ukraine. Historically (and for reason that i have never had explained to me) Ukraine has been the most pathologically anti-semitic nation on the face of the earth. During WW2, the Nazis practically had to have lotteries among Ukrainians to see would get to work in concentration camps slamming the doors shut on the gas chambers. Ukrainians could always be counted on to commit the most gruesome atrocities that even German SS men could not bear to do.

All that being said, I'm willing to give today's generation of Ukrainians the benefit of the doubt. So all in all, if I have to choose between having a Ukrainian PM with links to anti-semites who is also a puppet of a pig like Vladimir Putin, OR a Ukrainian PM with links to anti-semites who wants to join the European Union - I choose the latter.

If i were a Ukrainian Jew (or any other minority) I would have more faith that my rights would be protected by the European Court of Justice in Brussels than in some neo-fascist court of star chamber in Moscow.


From: Toronto | Registered: Sep 2002  |  IP: Logged
miles
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Babbler # 7209

posted 27 November 2004 11:59 PM      Profile for miles     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by Stockholm:

If i were a Ukrainian Jew (or any other minority) I would have more faith that my rights would be protected by the European Court of Justice in Brussels than in some neo-fascist court of star chamber in Moscow.

It is sad when a minority anywhere has to take the lesser of 2 evils and rely on an outside third party court to live.

It make one wonder about how great we all have it here no matter what problems we face day in and day out


From: vaughan | Registered: Oct 2004  |  IP: Logged

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