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UCC CMHR | 10Feb2013 | Paul Grod  [19:36]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_zuP57u9lB0

Leading the community forward

Community Townhall Meeting -- Winnipeg, MB -- February 10, 2013
Paul Grod, President of Ukrainian Canadian Congress
Taras Zalusky, Executive Director

Paul Grod informs the Ukrainian community of the inadequacies of the plans to display the Holodomor (famine-genocide in 1932-33 in Ukraine) in the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR).

[00:23 -- 01:14]  In 2003 Paul Grod, Ostap Hawaleshka and Lesia Swaliuk(?) met with "Izzy" Asper and supported his vision of the CMHR when he guaranteed in writing that the Holodomor, the Internment of Ukrainian-Canadians during WWI, and that Ukrainians as victims  and not perpetrators of Nazi atrocities during WWII would be prominently displayed in the CMHR. (3 commitments.)

[01:26] Andrij Hladyshevsky on behalf of UCC and the Shevchenko Foundation was at the initial soil turning for the CMHR.

[01:54 -- 02:42] Content Advisory Committee report did not once mention the Holodomor, not once mention the crimes of Soviet Communism. UCC made 5 presentations to Advisory Committee which were all ignored.

[02:56 -- 03:23] In early December 2012, Stuart Murray, Angela Cassie, Clint Curle came to UCC meeting in Montreal. UCC Board bluntly told them that the plans that they outlined were not acceptable.

[03:30 -- 04:12] On Friday, 08Feb2013, Paul Grod, Ostap Hawaleshka, Taras Zalusky and others(?) toured the CMHR facility. Despite earlier assurances from CMHR personnel that the Holodomor would be prominently displayed: "Frankly, we got a snow job."

[04:13 -- 11:04]  Paul Grod shows slides of the plans for the CMHR which has a huge gallery for the Holocaust and just panels for the Holodomor amongst the 5 genocides recognized by the government of Canada and no exhibit for the Internment of Ukrainians during WWI. "Completely inappropriate. Unacceptable. Insulting."

[11:05]  Unknown#1 asks why we are supporting that rather than our own community?

[11:19 -- 14:24] Ostap Hawaleshka outlines how he reacted to the tour -- "absolutely shocked". Ukraine lost one-third of its population. Insulted by comments concerning toilets. Withhold any funding that can still be withheld.

[14:25] Unknown#2 asks what is the compromise that Grod proposes?

[14:30 -- 17:51] Grod states that response of CMHR has always been silence to UCC proposals. "Exhibits are being sent to New York." [W.Z. Why? Can't this be done in Canada?] Grod shows his proposed compromise on the slides: #1 Prominent WWI Internment display; #2 War Measures Act displayed; #3 Holodomor gallery where UN display is planned and Holodomor theatre where agreement had previously been achieved (and now reneged upon).

[17:52 -- 19:17] Grod proposes that we make this a major issue in the Ukrainian community and across Canada. Telephone, write letters to MPs, news media, etc. "Go on offensive."