The Washington Group elects Ihor Kotlarchuk as president (06/11/00)

The Washington Group elects Ihor Kotlarchuk as president

by Yaro Bihun

WASHINGTON - Ihor Kotlarchuk, a senior trial attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice, was elected as the eighth president of The Washington Group (TWG), an association of Ukrainian American professionals based in the nation's capital.

Mr. Kotlarchuk succeeded Orest Deychakiwsky, a staff advisor with the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, who is stepping down after two years at the helm of TWG. The change was made during the organization's annual meeting here on May 19.

Though elected for one year, if tradition holds Mr. Kotlarchuk will lead this country's largest Ukrainian professionals organization for the next two years. Seven of the eight TWG presidents since the organization's founding in 1985 have served two terms. One president served three terms.

Known for sponsoring the popular annual leadership conference and numerous political, economic and cultural events in Washington, TWG, unlike many Ukrainian American organizations, has been consistently growing over the 15 years of its existence. With almost a 7 percent jump in membership over the past year, TWG now has 433 members - about half living in the greater Washington area, and the remainder hailing from other parts of the United States as well as from Ukraine and other countries around the world.

Mr. Kotlarchuk will work with a virtually unchanged executive board of directors, on which he had served as public relations director. The new board includes: Anya Silecky, vice-president; Michael Drabyk, secretary; Roman Stelmach, treasurer; Juliana Kinal, membership; Tanya Stasiuk, events; Oles Berezhny, special projects; Andy Szul, public relations, Laryssa Chopivsky, Cultural Fund director; Adrian Karmazyn, Fellowship Fund director; and Mr. Deychakiwsky, who now occupies the "immediate past president" position on the board.

The new board will also include the former U.S. commercial attaché in Kyiv, Andrew Bihun, who will chair the TWG Business Development Forum he is in the process of forming with the intent of expanding U.S.-Ukrainian business relations.

Mr. Kotlarchuk joined the U.S. Department of Justice as a trial attorney in the Tax Division in 1973 and has since moved up to the position of senior trial attorney in its Criminal Division.

Earlier, from 1969 to 1973, he served on active duty as a captain in the U.S. Army Judge Advocate General's Corps (JAG), which included a tour of duty in Vietnam. He recently retired as a colonel from the U.S. Army Reserve, where he received numerous awards and commendations, including the Bronze Star Medal and the Presidential Legion of Merit.

He has in the past and continues to travel extensively to Ukraine to work on legal, military and judicial assistance projects sponsored by the State Department, U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Justice.

He received his B.S. degree in business (1965) and his J.D. (1968) from Fordham University. He also received an L.L.M. in tax law (1974) and an M.A. in political science (1982) from Georgetown University. He is admitted to practice in New York state and in the District of Columbia and before the U.S. Tax Court, U.S. Court of Military Appeals and the U.S. Supreme Court.

In his brief acceptance speech, Mr. Kotlarchuk, who also serves as the president of the Ukrainian Association of Washington, underscored the need for expanding cooperation among Ukrainian American organizations.

While TWG has worked with many Ukrainian American organizations in its numerous programs and projects - especially in last year's Joint Conferences in Washington - it has focused much of its cooperative activities on leading Washington-area mainstream educational, think-tank and cultural institutions, as well as the Embassy of Ukraine.

The TWG annual meeting program also included a presentation by Bohdan Budzan, the director general or the International Management Institute in Kyiv, and the showing of a documentary on early Ukrainian settlers in Canada by film maker Slavko Nowytski.

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