EDITORIAL: Unsung heroes (11/10/96)

EDITORIAL

Unsung heroes

Twenty years have passed since the world heard about the Ukrainian Public Group to Promote the Implementation of the Helsinki Accords, known simply as the Ukrainian Helsinki Group, which was founded on November 9, 1976, in Kyiv.

Much has happened since the time when a small group of 10 dissidents gathered in Kyiv to form this group dedicated to monitoring human rights violations; at that time in the repressive Soviet Union, it was a great act of courage to challenge the authority of the Communist state headed by Leonid Brezhnev.

To do so in Ukraine was doubly courageous, for here the repression of national rights was harsher than in any other republic of the Soviet Union. Between 60-70 percent of all political prisoners in the Soviet gulag were Ukrainians, persecuted for their national and religious beliefs. The fearless UHG's program focused on the Ukrainian national question as an integral component of human rights issues. They were charged with keeping the spirit of the Ukrainian national movement alive at a time when there appeared to be little hope for the Ukrainian cause.

Despite the fact that the human rights activists formed an open association dedicated to the non-violent struggle for the human rights commitments voluntarily undertaken by the USSR through various international covenants, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the newly concluded Helsinki Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe - in line with the Soviet Constitution - the crackdown on the Ukrainian Helsinki Group began almost immediately, with the first arrests coming just three months after the founding of the group, in the winter of 1977.

Today, Ukraine is a free and independent country; it has one of the best human rights records of all the former Soviet republics. It's newly adopted democratic Constitution devotes a full chapter (Chapter II ) and 48 articles (Article 21-68) to human and citizens' rights, freedoms and duties.

Many of the 37 members who joined the Ukrainian Helsinki Group in the late 1970s and suffered for this act of conscience have lived to see independent Ukraine; they were the grassroots movement that kept the Ukrainian spirit alive during decades of Soviet Communist rule. They are the unsung heroes who were Ukrainian patriots - ready to give their life for their country and for their beliefs - at a time when this was a dangerous proposal.

They are already a part of history; they are also the righteous conscience for a generation emerging from Soviet reality that attempted to destroy their moral fibers. Some continue to be the voice of dignity and justice in Ukraine today, but many have been forgotten - or even worse - never acknowledged by the government of Ukraine. Although over the last several years the Ukrainian government has rehabilitated its political prisoners, it has learned very little from their experiences.

To be sure, there is now a mention of the fate of Ukraine's political prisoners in a few newly published textbooks. But, the Ukrainian government pays little attention to these former prisoners of conscience, Ukraine's living history.

One prime example is the fact that the government did not send a representative to honor the Ukrainian Helsinki Group's anniversary commemorations last week.

Can Ukraine be a truly democratic, sovereign and independent country if these unsung heroes are ignored?