Sandarmokh and today’s society
How the victims of the Great Terror have been honored in Odesa and the historian Serhii Shevchenko was not allowed in Russia
August 5 marks the Memorial Day of the Victims of the Great Terror of 1937-38. On this day 75 years ago by an operation order of the USSR NKVD mass repressions, executions, exile – basically the era of the Great Terror had started.
Tribute to those killed in that era has been paid in Odesa. Historian Oleksandr Muzychko wrote about it in detail.
There also has been formed a Ukrainian delegation consisting of about 30 people who went to Russia to visit the memorials erected in recent decades in the places of executions and mass graves of victims of the communist terror. However, when crossing the Ukrainian-Belarusian border the delegation “lost” one of its members. Historian and journalist Serhii Shevchenko, author of researches on Solovki and Sandarmokh was not allowed to cross the border without any good reason.
This situation reminds of the cases of recent denial of entry to Russian Federation for public figure Oleksandr Solontai and The Day’s special reporter Mykola Khriienko.
Of course, Ukraine also has a list of people with a status of persona non grata. However, the difference in approaches and criteria is obvious. For example, compare the statements made by Aleksandr Dugin and Konstantin Zatulin, widely known for their Ukrainophobic views and who have been recently granted the right to entry Ukraine again, with journalistic research work of Khriienko and Shevchenko.
The Day spoke about the mentioned approaches and criteria with those, who have at some point faced the problem of crossing the border with Russia.
COMMENTARIES
Mykola KHRIIENKO, journalist, The Day’s special reporter:
“I wrote a letter to the Minister of Foreign Affairs Kostiantyn Hryshchenko back on April 28. Just a few days ago I learned that there had come an answer from the Russian side. I haven’t seen it personally but the ministry’s spokesman Oleksandr Dykusarov told that I was denied the entry to the RF due to the order of the Russian FSB. It was suggested that for further explanation I should appeal to the Migration Service of Chukotka Autonomous District. I really had a problem in Chukotka because of the arrival to the border area without a permit, but, as I explained, then we figured it all out and the incident was over.
“Since there were no charges brought officially, the question arises: why did this happen? I would not want to think that this decision has been politically motivated.
“What concerns Serhii Shevchenko, I read his books – they are well-reasoned. In general, if a person is working for sake of rapprochement and understanding between peoples and his activity is not contrary to human values, we need to let them be able to work.”
Oleksandr SOLONTAI, expert at the Institute of Political Education:
“In non-democratic countries there is such notion as an undesirable person and no explanations are provided for that. Names of such people get on the lists of border guards, customs officials – everyone involved in border guarding on the instructions of the security services. Agencies motivate the decision with their own judgment (either they did not like the person or their way of thinking) without publicly giving any reasons for putting them on the list of personas non grata. They believe that their authoritarianism is threatened by certain people. In case with historians it is about unveiling historical truth, with politician – a different standpoint, and with teachers – alternative methods of teaching. They see different threats in each person, but all of these alleged threats are caused by the fear of the Russian leadership for that information, science, or education may undermine the ruling authoritarian regime. In general, they are constantly expanding the Russian ‘black list.’
“However, while in Russia they protect not only their country, but also their non-democratic regime, fearing that democracy could cause harm, in Ukraine we have the opposite situation: we do not protect not only the regime, which is transforming into authoritarian, but we also do not protect our country. That is why, people who defame our country can easily enter into the territory of Ukraine and nobody cares about it.”
