FCC complaint is filed, demonstration slated in NYC (11/13/94)

FCC complaint is filed, demonstration slated in NYC

by Khristina Lew

JERSEY CITY, N.J. The Ukrainian American community continues to protest the inflammatory "60 Minutes" segment on alleged anti-Semitism in western Ukraine, filing a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), augmenting it's letter-writing campaign to include the program's sponsors, meeting with CBS affiliates, and organizing a demonstration at CBS headquarters in Manhattan for November 14.

On November 10, the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America, citing the Fairness Doctrine, which requires broadcasters to provide adequate coverage of controversial issues of public importance and to ensure that the coverage fairly reflects differing viewpoints on the issues, filed a complaint with the FCC against CBS flagship stations or network affiliates in Albany, Baltimore, Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago, Detroit, Hartford, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis/St. Paul, New York, Philadelphia and Washington.

The complaint, filed under the personal attack rules of the Fairness Doctrine, alleges:

"On October 23, 1994, at approximately 7 p.m. EDT, during CBS '60 Minutes,' respondents [CBS flagship stations and affiliates] broadcast a statement impugning Ukrainians as 'genetically anti-Semitic.' This statement constituted a personal attack on an identified group, persons of Ukrainian ancestry, approximately 1.5 million of whom reside in the United States.

"Respondents acted unfairly and unreasonably in failing to provide an opportunity for the presentation of an opposing viewpoint. Having received notice of complainant's [the UCCA] claim, the respondents acted unfairly and unreasonably in refusing to broadcast a retraction, opposing viewpoint or other adequate remedial programming."

The complaint was submitted with a seven-page memorandum of points, and requests that the respondents offer a "reasonable opportunity for the presentation of an opposing viewpoint in the form of a fairly balanced program on Jewish-Ukrainian relations, both past and present, including without limitation, a statement from Rabbi Yaakov D. Bleich as the representative of the Jewish community in Ukraine."

Letter-writing campaign

The second prong of the community's letter campaign targets companies that advertised during the October 23 airing of "60 Minutes."

Launched by the Ukrainian Professional Society of Philadelphia and the Federation of Ukrainian American Business and Professional Organizations in the first days of November, the effort calls on individuals to write letters to AT&T Corp., Cadillac Motor Car Division, Chrysler Corp., Enterprise Rent-A-Car Inc., General Mills Inc., General Motors Corp., The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., International Business Machines Corp., Merrill Lynch and Co. Inc., Oldsmobile Motor Car Division, Toyota Motor Manufacturing USA Inc., Toyota Motor Sales USA Inc., United Parcel Service Inc., United States Postal Service and Wal-Mart Stores Inc., protesting their sponsorship of "60 Minutes" and urging them to pressure CBS to retract "The Ugly Face of Freedom" segment.

In a letter to every sponsor of the program from the Ukrainian American Professionals and Business Persons Association of New York and New Jersey, President Areta Pawlynsky threatened a boycott of the sponsor's product by the Ukrainian American community if the company does not prevail on CBS to apologize for its libel of Ukrainians and agree to a retraction. She entreated, "if your company declines our request, we will have no choice but to mobilize both within our community and outside it for a boycott of your company's products. Failure on our part would, by our continued patronage of the products whose sale pays for Morley Safer's salary, place us in the intolerable position of, in effect, subsidizing CBS's defamation of us."

UCCA President Askold Lozynskyj, in his letter to each sponsor, stated, "Unfortunately, and we are assuming, unwittingly, you lent your good name to this program by sponsoring it as an advertiser. We would appreciate your communicating with Laurence A. Tisch, chairman, president and CEO of CBS, to express your outrage that CBS advertisers are sponsoring racist hate broadcasting. Furthermore, kindly relate to CBS that you will cease doing business with CBS unless an apology is issued to the viewers for this misinformation."

Community to demonstrate

The genesis for the Monday, November 14, 3 p.m. demonstration at CBS headquarters (524 W. 57th St.) springs from Ukrainian Human Rights Committee President Ulana Mazurkevich following her November 2 telephone conversation with Don Hewitt, executive producer of "60 Minutes." Mrs. Mazurkevich, who participated in the October 31 meeting between representatives of the Ukrainian American community and CBS officials at the network's headquarters, contacted Mr. Hewitt to voice her disappointment with the proceedings of the meeting.

According to Mrs. Mazurkevich, Mr. Hewitt claimed that he has spoken to CBS reporters and historians and that, from a historical perspective, "60 Minutes" was not as wrong as the Ukrainian American community thinks.

With the support of the Ukrainian Educational and Cultural Center in Philadelphia, the United Ukrainian American Organizations of New York and the UCCA New Jersey State Council, plans for the demonstration were launched on November 9. Bus service from Philadelphia will be provided; for more information contact the UECC, (215) 663-1166.

On November 2, representatives of Chicago's Ukrainian American community, Orest Baranyk, Julian Kulas and Mykhailo Klysh, met with Robert McGann, CBS News Division vice-president and Chicago CBS station WBBM general manager. According to UCCA Vice-President Baranyk, Mr. McGann, having received 2,000 letters protesting the segment, offered the community air time on the local "Newsmakers" program to rebut the "60 Minutes" segment.

The Ukrainian American community and its numerous organizations has been solidly unified in its reaction to "The Ugly Face of Freedom" segment.

An ad hoc coalition of representatives of community organizations, as well as interested individuals, has been meeting each Friday at the headquarters building of the Ukrainian National Association in Jersey City. The first such meeting, initiated by UNA Vice-President Nestor Olesnycky, was held on November 4.

Among the organizations represented at that meeting and/or the November 11 gathering were: the Ukrainian American Bar Association, the Federation of Ukrainian American Business and Professional Organizations, Veterans of the 1st Division of the Ukrainian National Army, Americans for Human Rights in Ukraine, the Ukrainian National Center: History and Information Network (UNCHAIN), the Children of Chornobyl Relief Fund, the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute and the Ukrainian Catholic Church.

Also present on November 11 were representatives of Ukraine's Mission to the United Nations.

The ad hoc group decided it would meet weekly, as long as the need exists, in order to work out strategy to secure a complete retraction from CBS and counter the negative publicity that has already occurred as a result of the "60 Minutes" broadcast.

For purposes of communications, the ad hoc group agreed that the Ukrainian National Association's special projects coordinator, Oksana Trytjak, would be the liaison person. She may be reached at the UNA, (201) 451-2200.

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