Dr. Gudziak refused explaining: “Signing a document such as the letter that was presented for signature to me is tantamount to agreeing to cooperate (collaborate) with the SBU. The person signing in effect agrees with the contents of the letter and their implication. In KGB practice getting a signature on a document that was drafted and kept by the KGB was a primary method of recruiting secret collaborators.”
To this he added: “Measures of this nature create apprehension and unease. They are meant to intimidate university administrations and students. They are part of a whole pattern of practice that is well known to the Ukrainian population. The revival of such practices is a conscious attempt to revive the methods of the Soviet totalitarian past and to re-instil fear in a society that was only beginning to feel its freedom.”
Dr. Gudziak also stated that on May 11, when Ukrainian students were organizing protest activity in Lviv as well as Kyiv, a representative of the office of Ihor Derzhko, the Deputy Head of the Lviv Regional Administration responsible for humanitarian affairs called the rectorate and asked for statistics on the number of students participating in the demonstrations.
This is just another step in the increasing campaign by the Yanukovych regime to stifle dissent and curb such basic liberties as the freedom of assembly and freedom of speech to a degree unprecedented in the brief history of independent Ukraine. Just before Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s visit to Kyiv on May 17-18, a judge in Kyiv Oblast’s administrative court banned any pickets in front of the presidential administration and in most central areas of Kyiv.
What we are witnessing, especially in the SBU’s return to the methods employed by the state terrorist agency, the KGB, is nothing short of the resurrection of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic It is a trend we must oppose most vehemently. We must also express our full solidarity with the democratic forces of Ukraine.
As Fr. Gudziak notes only two of the approximately 170 universities of Ukraine have been voicing their protest regarding recent political and educational developments “it can be expected that UCU will be subject to particular attention and possible pressure in the coming months. The solidarity of the international community, especially the academic world, will be important in helping UCU maintain a position of principle regarding intellectual and social freedom.
UCU gets considerable support from the Ukrainian diaspora in North America, mainly through its fundraising arm, the Ukrainian Catholic Education Foundation. It also remains a bastion of freedom in an increasingly authoritarian Ukraine.
Rev. Dr. Gudziak’s courageous stand deserves our moral and material support.
Let us boldly stand in solidarity with UCU.
Marco Levytsky is the editor and publisher of Ukrainian News, a bi-weekly newspaper distributed across Canada.
