A current controversy brewing in Ukraine illustrates just how relevant the Soviet past is to Ukraine’s present and future—and just how powerful the forces are that aim to reconnect Ukraine and its former hegemon, Russia.
Ukrainian filmmakers have been working on a movie depicting the life and struggle of Vasiliy Stus, a Ukrainian writer and dissident who was tortured to death in a Siberian labor camp in 1985. He was a steadfast advocate for Ukraine’s independence back when the country was part of the USSR. Because of his poetry and critical views toward the regime, Stus was eventually accused of anti-Soviet activities and propaganda. In 1980, he was sentenced to ten years in labor camps, where he subsequently died six years later.
