EDITORIAL: Medvid denied, again (10/29/00)

EDITORIAL

Medvid denied, again

Officials at the U.S. Consulate in Kyiv, located several blocks from the U.S. Embassy, are quick to ascertain that they are happy when they can extend a Ukrainian a visa, and that they would like to see all qualified Ukrainians who so desire receive one. That is downright upbeat.

They produce statistics which show that the number of business and tourist visas granted to Ukrainians rose by 38 percent in the last year. We commend their efforts to give more Ukrainians the opportunity to visit the United States.

We also understand the difficulty consular officers face in dealing on a daily basis with hundreds of applicants - many of whom seem ready to go to whatever lengths necessary to obtain a visa. We have heard of the fraudulent explanations and the fake documents utilized to obtain permission to visit the United States.

We realize that a notable portion of Ukrainians who obtain visas of every type have no intention of returning. We see the need to establish that visa applicants have connections to Ukraine sufficiently strong to ensure their return. We also agree that the task is daunting. What we don't understand is what can be done when a person with honest intentions is denied a visa because he did not fulfill the requirements of a consular officer who made the subjective decision. To be more precise: How does Myroslav Medvid obtain a visa?

On October 11 of this year America again rejected a request by Myroslav Medvid to enter the country. This time all he wanted to do was visit. Today the Rev. Medvid is a parish priest in good standing in a village near Lviv, but in October 1985 he was a Soviet sailor whose plea for political asylum went unheeded after he twice escaped a Soviet grain trawler docked near New Orleans only to be returned by U.S. immigration officials.

Earlier this year The Weekly tracked down Father Medvid 15 years after his debacle at the hands of bungling U.S. government officials who claimed they did not understand the 25-year-old sailor was seeking political asylum, and interviewed him for a news feature. Afterwards the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic priest expressed a desire to travel to the United States. He explained that he wanted to thank the politicians and members of the Ukrainian American community who he believed had saved his life by keeping his name before the world press after he was returned to the Soviet Union. He had a simple request: to meet with them and celebrate a liturgy together.

The Weekly took upon itself the task of finding a U.S organization to help make the Rev. Medvid's visit possible. The Ukrainian Congress Committee of America agreed to extend an invitation to include the Ukrainian priest as the keynote speaker in a Millennium commemoration of the Great Famine of 1932-1933 scheduled for St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York on November 18.

It seemed that all the pieces were in place for the Rev. Medvid to undertake a mini-tour of the Ukrainian American communities when an unplanned although not unexpected obstacle got in the way: the consular section of the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv rejected Father Medvid's application for a visa based on Section 214 (B) of the Immigration and Nationalities Act, which places on the applicant "the burden of overcoming a statutory presumption of intending immigration." In other words, the Rev. Medvid failed to prove that he would return to Ukraine after his U.S. visit.

After his rejection the Ukrainian priest expressed bewilderment that U.S. officials did not trust the word of a man of the cloth. Yes, we understand that everyone must be suspected when so many attempt to manipulate and defraud. But we also believe that a person like the Rev. Medvid, who suffered so much because of rash decisions made by a U.S. administration now long out of office, should have the opportunity to travel to the United States to visit and thank those who helped him.

True, the Rev. Medvid does not have what the U.S. consular section seems to require to prove a strong connection to Ukraine, that is, property and a good income. But he is a parish priest, and he does have a bishop and a flock that believe in him and his return. That should count for a lot.

We expect that after the appeal that Father Medvid will file with the consular section of the U.S. Embassy in the next days, U.S authorities will consider the Ukrainian priest's case apart from the thousands of others it must handle. After all, he is a person who survived a tragic ordeal in which the U.S. government played at least some role and, therefore, should be treated with special consideration.

We hope that the case of Myroslav Medvid is reconsidered for it would be another terrible injustice if he were denied entry onto U.S soil, again.

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