Ukrainian Reactionaries and Promoters of Nazi Collaborators Hold Triennial Congress in Toronto
The Ukrainian Canadian Congress (UCC) held its 28th triennial congress in Toronto from November 13 to 16, 2025. Founded in 1940 on an anti-communist basis in line with imperialist opposition to the Soviet Union, the UCC owes its current prominence to the Cold War efforts of the Canadian state to prop it up as the "official" voice of Ukrainian Canadians. This was done to displace the well-established organizations that were sympathetic to communism and social progress in Canada, such as the Association of United Ukrainian Canadians (AUUC) that grew out of the Ukrainian Labour Farmer Temple Association (ULFTA) founded in Winnipeg in 1918. In 1940, the Canadian government banned the ULFTA, seized its assets and gave them to the pro-fascist Ukrainian National Federation.
6th Convention of the Ukrainian
Labour Farmer Temple Association
(ULFTA), in front of the
Ukrainian Labour Temple in Winnipeg, January 1925.
The UCC was notably bolstered in 1950 when the Canadian state brought to Canada some 2,000 Ukrainian reactionaries and Nazi collaborators, allowing them to escape being brought to justice for their war crimes. Another 1,000 Nazi collaborators, mainly from the Baltic states were also permitted entry to Canada during the same period.
The official stamp of the Canadian government's approval of the UCC was also evident with the participation in its congress of various politicians, including former Senator Romeo Dallaire, Senator Stan Kutcher, then Minister of National Defence David McGuinty, and former cabinet minister Chrystia Freeland. Also taking part were a former Justice Minister of Alberta, a former deputy chief of staff for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, members of academia, journalists and business executives of Ukrainian background, as well as leaders from various Ukrainian Canadian organizations with a reactionary bent in keeping with that of the UCC.
The proceedings of the UCC congress put the anti-communist basis of the organization on full display.
For example, the first day of the congress, November 13, featured as its main event a town hall on "Canadian Leadership on Holodomor Awareness and Education" to promote this anti-communist falsification of history and attempts to spread it within Canada and abroad. Not surprisingly, the UCC took its cue for the town hall on "Canadian leadership" from special remarks delivered by U.S. "journalist and historian," Anne Applebaum, given over video. Billed as the author of the book Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine, her other books display a similar morbid anti-communist obsession with spreading disinformation about the Soviet Union and the people's republics of eastern Europe.
The town hall had three sessions:
- The Canadian Experience: Building Capacity
- Education in Canada and Beyond: Mainstreaming the Holodomor
- The Global Experience: Forging Partnerships
A prominent participant in these sessions was the Holodomor Research and Education Consortium (HREC) that is part of the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies based at the University of Alberta. Canada is one of the first of the small minority of countries that back the Holodomor myth as fact and promote it as official state policy. The CIUS was instrumental in reviving the Nazi and Hearst newspaper myths about a deliberate famine in the 1980's. .
On November 14, the main event featured Chrystia Freeland in what was then her new capacity as Canada's Special Representative for Reconstruction in Ukraine, in both a "fireside chat" and as a keynote speaker. Freeland was later caught in a conflict of interest for taking up a similar position for the neo-Nazi government headed by Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Ukraine and had to resign her seat in January of this year, leading to the April 13 by-election in University--Rosedale.
The sessions with Freeland were followed by a lunch with Ambassador of Canada to Ukraine, Natalka Cmoc, and Ambassador of Ukraine to Canada, Andrii Plakhotniuk. The two were to "share insights on Canada--Ukraine relations, current priorities, and the role of our communities in strengthening ties between the two countries."
The afternoon's keynote speaker was Oleksandra Matviichuk, a Ukrainian human rights lawyer and head of the Center for Civil Liberties in Kyiv. She was billed as leading "efforts to advance democratic reforms, protect human rights, and document war crimes committed during Russia's aggression against Ukraine." The UCC notes that the Center for Civil Liberties was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize 2022 "in recognition of its work promoting civil society and justice." To anyone paying attention, such a plaudit puts this organization in the company of warmongers, reactionaries and counter-revolutionaries that the imperialists promote to advance their aims of aggression, war and regime change.
Some notable workshops on November 15 included one called "Navigating Disinformation," as if the U.S./NATO proxy war is not itself the product of imperialist disinformation aimed as justifying NATO expansion and aggression against Russia. The session claimed, "In today's information environment, disinformation threatens democracy and community trust. Join international experts Anatoliy Grudz [Director of Research, Ted Rogers School of Management], Justin Ling [journalist], Philip Mai [Senior Researcher and Co-Director, Social Media Lab, Toronto Metropolitan University], and Alexandra Pavliuc [researcher at Oxford and Senior Data Analyst at Global Affairs] as they explore how to recognize and respond to false narratives, strengthen media literacy, and build resilience against hostile influence campaigns. The discussion will highlight tools and strategies for protecting our community against manipulation both online and offline."
Another workshop called "Engaging Government" focused on promoting the UCC's narrow chauvinist aims within government. The workshop's description reads: "How can we build stronger relationships with policymakers and ensure our community's voice is heard? Hear from the experienced voices of Tyler Shandro [former Minister of Justice of Alberta], Danylo Korbabicz [Executive Director, Association of Manitoba Municipalities], Denis Volkov [Partner, Prospectus Public Affairs], and Marianna Tretiak [Chair, American Coalition for Ukraine] as they share strategies for engaging officials at all levels of government, strengthening advocacy, and driving meaningful change. Together, we will explore how to amplify Ukrainian Canadian priorities in today's complex political landscape."
The proceedings
on the final day of the UCC congress, November
16, included a report on the Ukrainian World Congress (UWC) from
former
UCC President Paul Grod, now UWC President. The UCC is a member
of the
UWC, which is the international body that advances the same
reactionary
aims as the UCC,
including the veneration of Ukrainian fascists, war criminals
and Nazi
collaborators from World War II, as well as backing the
descendants of
these forces running amok in Ukraine today.
It is also important to note that the UCC is a promoter and funder of the vile anti-communist monument in Ottawa that seeks to glorify Nazism and portray Ukrainian collaborators with Nazi fascism and the "victims" of the imaginary Holodomor as victims of communism. Its membership and other participants in its congress have direct ties to the monument. For example, one speaker at the congress was Krystina Waler, Director of Ukrainian Initiatives at the Temerty Foundation. This foundation was established by James Temerty, a key UCC member whose family was listed in the category of those who contributed more than $100,000 to the monument as well as has purchased several "bricks" with the names of family members they claim were "victims of communism" that were to be displayed as part of the anti-communist monument. Of course, the proponents of the monument, which include the Government of Canada, have not been able to put up any names because they are rife with war criminals and Nazi collaborators. Meanwhile, the monument is falling into disrepair already, with maintenance costs, to be paid by Canadian taxpayers, expected to be far higher than projected.
It should also be recalled that the shady history of the UCC was brought to broad attention on September 22, 2023, when the Nazi collaborator Yaroslav Hunka was brought to the House of Commons on the initiative of the UCC. There, he received multiple ovations by parliamentarians for "fighting against Russia" during World War II. This was met by outrage from coast to coast to coast, as well as being decried internationally. Hunka is a longstanding member and contributor to the UCC. In a passing notice on its website, the UCC did not acknowledge why the incident was so offensive to so many people and refused to mention Hunka by name.
The activities of the UCC are of concern to Canadians and Quebeckers who honour the memory and sacrifice of all those who fought to defeat Nazi Germany and its collaborators in World War II. They reject how the UCC, with the backing of the Canadian state tramples on the historic verdict of World War II that fascism and Nazism must be vanquished to the dustbin of history.
The UCC's activities and the
privileged positions the
organization and its members have been given in Canadian
society,
including a seat at the cabinet table to set foreign policy
according
to their chauvinist and anti-Russian aims, are also of great
concern.
The reactionary aims of the UCC are
used to give legitimacy to NATO's expansion and warmongering
aims
against Russia, in which Canada is becoming more and more
embroiled, to
the tune of tens of billions of dollars, either for funding that
is
said to be for Ukraine's reconstruction or increased war
spending and
the militarization of
Canada's economy. These aims are anathema to the broad desire of
working people that the social wealth they produce must go to
funding
social programs not be misappropriated and misspent on war, and
for
Canada to be a Zone for Peace. This will necessarily require
getting
Canada out of NATO and
ending Canada's involvement in the U.S./NATO proxy war in
Ukraine.
(With files from UCC)
This article was published in
Volume 56 Number 5 - May 2026
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/TML2026/Articles/MS560510.HTM
Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca