1994: THE YEAR IN REVIEW

"60 Minutes" shows ugly face of media

On October 23, 17.5 million American households watched a "60 Minutes" broadcast that reported on the alleged resurgence of anti-Semitism in western Ukraine. Haunting images of young children marching in a torch-filled night flooded television screens, as did a weeping Simon Wiesenthal, touted by "60 Minutes" correspondent Morley Safer as "the world's number one Nazi hunter," who proclaimed at the end of the segment that "They [Ukrainians] have not changed."

The segment, titled "The Ugly Face of Freedom," managed to ascribe the beliefs of the UNA/UNSO, a fringe ultra-nationalist group, to the whole of western Ukraine, and alluded to all Ukrainians as "genetically anti-Semitic." Its staged drama, unidentified footage, historical inaccuracies, and sharply edited interviews with Cardinal Myroslav Ivan Lubachivsky and Msgr. Ivan Dacko of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church, and Rabbi Yaakov Dov Bleich, chief rabbi of Ukraine, raised the ire of the Ukrainian communities of North America as no other instance of Ukrainian defamation has in recent years.

With swift precision, Ukrainian institutions and Ukrainian communities in the United States and Canada lashed out at CBS and "60 Minutes," jamming CBS telephone lines with complaints, and writing letters to CBS executives and the sponsors of the program.

The Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church immediately issued a statement saying that the segment's producer, Jeffrey Fager, had misrepresented the thrust of the report, claiming the piece would focus on "post-Communist Ukraine." Rabbi Bleich too issued a statement that read, "I would like to state unequivocally that my words were quoted out of the context that they were said."

Ukraine's Embassy to the United States also reacted. In a letter to CBS News Division President Eric W. Ober, Valery Kuchinsky, charge d'affaires, relayed the Ukrainian government's "utter resentment at the stridently biased segment on the alleged rise of anti-Semitism" in western Ukraine, demanding that CBS carry a retraction and "present an official apology for its gross injustice to Ukraine and its people in the highly abusive report."

Ukrainian government officials in Kyyiv were apprised of the segment and communicated with the Jewish Council of Ukraine, the Jewish community's largest association, and the Council of Ethnic Associations of Ukraine. Joint action was to be taken. Embassy Press Counselor Dmytro Markov said that during Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma's state visit to the United States in late November, arrangements were made for the president to discuss the issue with Jewish leaders in New York and at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. The Embassy has circulated the texts of the Ukrainian president's addresses before both groups to the media.

Mr. Markov also reported that the issue has been brought up in Ukraine's press. The Ukrainian newspaper Za Vilnu Ukrainu, whose editor was featured in "The Ugly Face of Freedom," is scheduled to run an opinion piece written by Rabbi Bleich. The Ukrainian Congress Committee of America has made arrangements for Rabbi Bleich and an assistant to Cardinal Lubachivsky to appear on Lviv Television to condemn the "60 Minutes" segment and plead for peace between the Ukrainian and Jewish communities of western Ukraine.

The UCCA and the Ukrainian National Association launched a campaign within their branches to telephone/fax CBS in protest and demand the dismissal of Mr. Safer. UCCA branches were advised to communicate with CBS affiliates, many of whom are fleeing CBS for the Fox network, to request a meeting with the Ukrainian American community.

Representatives of the Rochester area community met with CBS affiliate WROC on October 28 and arranged for the airing of an "equal time" program on the station's "30 Minutes" program. On November 26, "30 Minutes" broadcast a report on the Ukrainian community's outrage over "The Ugly Face of Freedom" segment while providing an overview of independent Ukraine's recent history. The program featured interviews with UCCA President Askold Lozynskyj and UCCA Rochester Branch Vice-President Walter Zacharkiw.

On November 2, Chicago area community activists met with CBS affiliate WBBM and were offered air time to rebut the "60 Minutes" segment on the station's "Newsmakers" program. The affiliate's offer for a rebuttal program was later retracted.

In Detroit, the local CBS affiliate covered an October 27 community rally at the Ukrainian Cultural Center attended by some 600 Ukrainian Americans and aired it on that evening's 11 o'clock news. Ukrainian Cultural Center director and Detroit area UCCA President Borys Potapenko met with Michigan Reps. David Bonior and Sander Levin, who said they would speak out on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives regarding the issue.

A letter-writing campaign targeting the 15 corporate sponsors of the October 23 segment spearheaded by the Ukrainian Professional Society of Philadelphia and the Federation of Ukrainian American Business and Professional Organizations bore some results. Five corporations - Allstate Insurance, General Motors Corp., Merrill Lynch and Co. Inc., Toyota and United Parcel Service Inc. - sent letters to UCCA President Lozynskyj. Mr. Lozynskyj has called on Ukrainian Americans to boycott the products of the 10 remaining sponsors: AT&T Corp., Cadillac, Oldsmobile, Chrysler, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, General Mills, Goodyear Tire, International Business Machines, Wal-Mart and the Unites States Postal Service.

The first in a series of demonstrations protesting the segment was held at CBS offices in Philadelphia on October 24. Demonstrators met with the affiliate's producer and station director, who said they would arrange for a meeting with community representatives and "60 Minutes" Executive Producer Don Hewitt. That demonstration, and one held in Washington on November 2 at the CBS office there, attracted 100 Ukrainian Americans apiece. Demonstrators in Washington met with Vice-President and Bureau Chief Barbara S. Cochran.

A larger demonstration at both CBS's production and corporate headquarters in New York on November 14 attracted over 500 Ukrainian Americans from New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

On October 31, an ad hoc delegation of Ukrainian Americans met with Mr. Hewitt, CBS Vice-President Joseph Peyronnin, Mr. Safer and Mr. Fager at CBS headquarters in Manhattan. The Ukrainian delegation, which included two recent Jewish émigrés from Ukraine and Eastern Europe, received no commitment from CBS to publicly rectify the inflammatory segment.

Instead, according to Mr. Lozynskyj, a meeting participant, CBS pledged to revisit the issue, convene its own meeting of researchers and experts, convene a meeting with Rabbi Bleich, and then make a decision. The one-hour, 40-minute meeting was organized by Mr. Hewitt at the insistence of Ukrainian Human Rights Committee President Ulana Mazurkevich. UNA Vice-President Nestor Olesnycky, Ukrainian Catholic Bishop Basil Losten and Rutgers University Prof. Taras Hunczak rounded out the Ukrainian delegation.

On November 1, Rabbi David Lincoln, the leader of the congregation at Park Avenue synagogue in Manhattan who had written a letter to CBS denouncing the inaccuracies and defamation in "The Ugly Face of Freedom" segment, received a conference call from Messrs. Safer and Fager, who tried to persuade him to accept their position.

On November 4, an ad hoc coalition of representatives of community organizations held its inaugural meeting at the Ukrainian National Association's headquarters in Jersey City, N.J. The group accepted as its mandate to secure a complete retraction from CBS and to counter the negative publicity that occurred as a result of "The Ugly Face of Freedom" segment.

The group reactivated the UNA-Ukrainian Heritage Defense Fund and launched a drive to collect funds to publish advertisements in major North American newspapers to set the record straight. According to UNA Special Project Coordinator Oksana Trytjak, the group's liaison, the defense fund has collected $27,000 to date, $10,000 of which was donated by the Veterans of the 1st Division of the Ukrainian National Army and $5,000 of which was donated by Selfreliance Federal Credit Union of New York. The UNA has promised to donate $10,000 to the fund.

Organizations represented at the weekly meetings are: 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 and Ukrainian Orthodox Churches.

On November 6, at the end of its program, "60 Minutes" read excerpts from Cardinal Lubachivsky's statement.

On November 10, the UCCA filed a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). 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 issue, the UCCA filed a complaint against 13 CBS flagship stations and network affiliates. The complaint is still pending.

In Canada, 490,000 households, mostly from Ontario, tuned in to "60 Minutes" on October 23, slightly more than usual. According to Nielsen Marketing Research, "60 Minutes" garnered an average of 403,000 Canadian households in eight previous shows.

The Ukrainian Canadian Congress launched its own letter writing campaign. On November 28 CanWest Global System, under whose aegis Global-TV, the Canadian network that carried the "60 Minutes" broadcast falls, issued an apology to the Ukrainian Canadian community in a letter to Orest Hrabowych of Willowdale, Ontario. In addition, CanWest Global System vice-president for legal and regulatory affairs, Glenn P. O'Farrell, advised Mr. Hrabowych that CanWest requested that it be notified by CBS International in advance if and when CBS intends to rebroadcast "The Ugly Face of Freedom" segment in order for CanWest to cover it with another segment.

Mrs. Mazurkevich, the impetus behind the October 31 meeting at CBS headquarters in Manhattan and the November 14 demonstration, has begun working with the watchdog group Accuracy in Media, which promised to disseminate information about the "60 Minutes" segment to various media.

According to Mr. Lozynskyj, The New York Times will publish an interview with Rabbi Bleich and the Wall Street Journal will carry an opinion editorial piece by the rabbi in upcoming issues.

All community organizations urge Ukrainian Americans to continue their protest.

Copyright © The Ukrainian Weekly, December 25, 1994, No. 52, Vol. LXII

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