REACTION TO PULITZER BOARD'S DECISION: Ukrainian National Women's League of America (12/14/03)

REACTION TO PULITZER BOARD'S DECISION

Ukrainian National Women's League of America

Below is the text of a letter sent on December 2 to the Pulitzer Prize Board by the Ukrainian National Women's League of America.

The Ukrainian National Women's League of America was founded in New York City in 1925. It is the oldest and largest women's organization in the United States, and an organization that comprises thousands of women who are proud to be Americans and also proud of their Ukrainian heritage.

Seventy years ago, members of our organization worked tirelessly to assist the victims of one of the worst genocides perpetrated during the 20th century. They also worked tirelessly to inform the world of the multifarious evil of a Soviet regime intent on the destruction of Ukrainians through starvation. Their efforts were aided by courageous and honorable journalists like Malcolm Muggeridge and Gareth Jones; they were impeded by cowards like Walter Duranty who conspired with Soviet authorities to hide the truth from the world.

Today, members of the Ukrainian National Women's League of America are appalled at the decision of the Pulitzer Prize Committee not to revoke the Pulitzer Prize awarded to Mr. Duranty. We believe it is our obligation to express our anger and disappointment at this decision and to appeal to the Committee to reconsider a decision we view as an egregious error in judgment.

Recently opened archives in Moscow and Kyiv give ample evidence of the Great Famine in Ukraine, as well as ample evidence of Mr. Duranty's lack of journalistic integrity. These archives show that more than 7 million and possibly as many as 10 million, Ukrainians died during the Famine, which was artificially engineered by Soviet authorities. These archives also show that Mr. Duranty's reports to The New York Times about conditions in Ukraine were deliberately and callously misleading.

The genocide of 1932-1933 was so well engineered that Soviet authorities ordered that dogs and other household pets be slaughtered so that after all grain and livestock had been confiscated, the people would have nothing at all to eat. Mr. Duranty, who visited Ukraine during this heinous time (with the blessing of the Soviet government), chose to ignore such cruel realities and chose instead to minimize and or even blatantly lie about what he witnessed. We can only imagine what self-serving motives prompted these lies, and we are dismayed that the Pulitzer Prize Committee has chosen to condone them.

The committee claims that the Pulitzer Prize was awarded to Mr. Duranty for articles and reports written at other times and on other themes and that it is for his excellent reports on these other themes that the Pulitzer Prize was awarded. To this we can only reply that a journalist's work must be judged in its entirety and that a journalist who covers up the genocide of millions of innocent people deserves contempt rather than recognition.

The committee's decision not to revoke the Pulitzer Prize awarded to this Stalinist puppet is inexcusable. It is an affront to every reporter and journalist who honors the profession by writing the truth. It is an injustice that defames American ideals and mocks the U.S. Bill of Rights by implying that freedom of the press means freedom to lie, freedom to ignore the truth and freedom to avoid responsibility.

Above all, your decision shows a callous disregard for the victims of the Great Famine. It was the work of people like Walter Duranty that permitted the Soviet regime to slaughter millions with impunity, shielded from public outrage by the lies of stooges who were more concerned with enhancing their own image by cultivating relationships with the Soviet elite. We are deeply saddened that you have chosen to protect this image rather than to expose Mr. Duranty for what he truly was, a man who lacked the courage and integrity to tell the world the truth and a man who disgraced a noble profession.

The decision that was made does credit to no one. In defending the indefensible you have degraded the Pulitzer Prize and made it a meaningless trophy that stands for nothing. We urge you to take the moral high ground in this matter, to have the courage to admit that an error was made, and to revoke a prize that should never have been awarded.

Respectfully yours,
Iryna Kurowyckyj, President
Ukrainian National Women's League of America, Inc.

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