SMS messages from the ambassador: how Kiev deserted inconvenient historians | Ukraine and Ukrainians: A View from Europe | DW

The creation of the German-Ukrainian Commission of Historians in 2015 was an initiative of German scientists who, after the Euromaidan and the start of the army battle in jap Ukraine, realized that Germany knew little about Ukraine and its historical past. For 5 years of labor, the fee has held a variety of scientific conferences. With the monetary assist of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) and the Robert Bosch Foundation, dozens of scientists and college students from Ukraine and Germany acquired scholarships for analysis work and participation in worldwide scientific occasions.

In addition, graduate college students and younger scientists at seminars organized on the initiative of the fee, collectively research the strategies of historic analysis. “We need to convey the German and Ukrainian cultures of historic analysis nearer collectively,” mentioned Martin Schulze Wessel, professor on the Ludwig-Maximilian University of Munich, in an interview with DW. Nevertheless, the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs withdrew patronage over the fee of historians, because it grew to become recognized on September 24.

Kiev’s discontent and the Holodomor concern

In current years, the fee, which incorporates seven Ukrainian and German scientists every, has often been publicly criticized by Ukraine’s Ambassador to Germany Andriy Melnyk. The diplomat reproaches the researchers, to begin with, for inadequate consideration to the Holodomor concern. When final fall the Bundestag fee accepted for consideration a public petition demanding to acknowledge the Holodomor as genocide of the Ukrainian individuals, Melnyk actively campaigned in an interview with German media for the adoption of such a decision and on the similar time accused the German-Ukrainian Commission of Historians of inaction on an concern that Kiev considers vital for its nationwide pursuits.

In a column within the Ukrainian Internet publication Evropeyskaya Pravda beneath the heading “Silence can be prison,” the ambassador final yr demanded a “reset” of the fee and sought the resignation of its Ukrainian co-chairman, famend historian Yaroslav Hrytsak. It is Gritsak and his Ukrainian colleagues who’re liable for the truth that the fee didn’t give you a decision recognizing the Holodomor as genocide, which would be an vital sign for German politicians.

As DW came upon, throughout inside discussions within the fee, Ukrainian historians referred to as on their German colleagues to undertake a joint decision in assist of recognizing the Holodomor as genocide of the Ukrainian individuals. However, as Professor Schulze Wessel famous in an interview with DW, there was no assist for this initiative amongst German historians, even if not one of the seven members of the fee questioned the genocidal nature of this crime.

“Some German students are inclined to outline the Holodomor as a crime in opposition to humanity. However, the issue, to begin with, is that the definition of genocide is formulated within the UN Convention of 1948, this makes genocide, to begin with, a time period utilized by worldwide legislation, and never historical past “, says Schulze Wessel.

Genocide: Historical or Political Term?

As Martin Schulze Wessel mentioned, German historians were afraid to get entangled in a political debate about whether or not the Bundestag should acknowledge the Holodomor as genocide. The German co-chairman of the fee notes that within the German educational custom, bilateral commissions of historians focus their work on matters associated to the widespread pages of the historical past of peoples.

In the case of Germany and Ukraine, this is, to begin with, the German occupation and the crimes of the Nazis throughout the Second World War. On these points, the fee not solely conducts scientific discussions, but additionally makes public statements. For instance, final yr, when plans were being mentioned in Berlin to construct a memorial to victims of Nazism in Poland, German and Ukrainian scientists issued a joint assertion by which they famous that such a memorial can’t ignore the reminiscence of victims of Nazi crimes in Ukraine and Belarus, about that are nonetheless little recognized in Germany.

“Commissions of historians are created to work on the joint burdens of historical past, this is their ethical obligation. Historical burdens in relations between different states (Ukraine and Russia because the authorized successor of the USSR. – Ed.) should be matters for the work of different commissions, “says a scientist from Munich. At the identical time, Professor Schulze Wessel strongly rejects Ambassador Melnik’s accusations of the fee’s inactivity.” In Germany, nobody has studied the Holodomor as a lot as our fee members. Nobody in Germany spoke in regards to the Holodomor so usually publicly, as I did, and in a Ukrainian manner, ”the professor emphasizes.

“The final straw” for the ambassador

In the tip, the denouement of the dispute between historians and the Ukrainian ambassador in Kiev was the withdrawal of the patronage of the fee by the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry. The division named the important thing grievance in opposition to the fee, specifically, “self-removal” from the dialogue within the Bundestag in regards to the Holodomor. ”“ Over the past year, the impression has not grown that in the existing format the commission’s activities correspond to the national interests of Ukraine. It was this that became the last straw of patience and led to the withdrawal of the patronage of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, “- said in a statement released on September 24. On the same day, a webinar on the Holodomor topic was held, which was organized by the German-Ukrainian Commission of Historians instead of a conference that did not take place in Berlin due to the pandemic.

As DW found out, on the eve of the webinar Andriy Melnyk sent SMS messages to Professor Schulze Wessel, which show a slightly different picture of what exactly became the “last straw” for the Ukrainian side. In his messages, Melnyk, in an ultimatum, demanded that the Munich professor remove from the agenda of the Holodomor webinar the report of Georgy Kasyanov, Head of the Department of Contemporary History and Politics at the Institute of History of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine.

Kasyanov is the author of over a dozen scientific publications on the discourses of Ukrainian historiography in the study of the Holodomor. He is a well-known critic of politicians’ attempts to interfere in scientific discussions. In Kasyanov’s report at the webinar, it was said, in particular, that in the Verkhovna Rada in recent years there have been more than a dozen proposals to introduce criminal or administrative liability for those who question the fact that the Holodomor was precisely genocide by definition.

“I do not deny that the state can assert certain truths at the political level. But I am categorically opposed to politicians telling me how to write about history as a scientist,” Kasyanov mentioned in an interview with DW. At the identical time, the historian famous that he himself doesn’t deny that the Holodomor was genocide, like all different individuals within the webinar, which came about on September 24. At the identical time, Kasyanov calls the ambassador’s makes an attempt to forestall his participation in discussions with German historians as a harmful precedent. “The mission of the scientist is to critically analyze the actions of politicians, and to not serve them,” reminds Georgy Kasyanov.

Berlin highlights the independence of the fee

Martin Schulze Wessel, in an interview with DW, referred to as the SMS from Andrey Melnik “a blatant assault on the autonomy of scientific work.” Photos of those messages from Melnik were revealed on the web site of the German-Ukrainian Commission of Historians. “We cannot be an instrument of Ukrainian historical policy. If we understand the work of historians in this way, then they can be immediately employed in ministries,” the professor notes.

DW’s interlocutor on the German Foreign Ministry famous that Berlin regrets Kiev’s determination to revoke patronage. At the identical time, German diplomats notice that the German-Ukrainian Commission of Historians is an impartial establishment. “For the way forward for our bilateral relations, an impartial scientific understanding of our widespread historical past continues to be the central job,” the German Foreign Ministry notes. Whether the Holodomor pertains to problems with common historical past, diplomats in Berlin didn’t specify.

The scandal round Kiev’s withdrawn of patronage is not good in terms of spreading data in regards to the historical past of Ukraine in Germany, German historian and political scientist Gerhard Simon mentioned in an interview with DW. Professor Simon is one of the energetic supporters of the adoption by the German Bundestag of a decision on the Holodomor, which Kiev has to date been attempting to realize to no avail. The researcher notes that Ambassador Andrei Melnik is making nice efforts on this matter, however makes an attempt to affect the work of the fee, in his opinion, have gone too far. “A diplomat can’t insist that a scientist should not be invited to a dialogue,” Simon says.

Among the primary obstacles to the adoption by the Bundestag of the decision on the Holodomor, Gerhard Simon names the fears of many deputies to lastly damage relations with Russia. At the identical time, the historian hopes that in the end the German parliament will give an evaluation of the Holodomor, which will assist draw the eye of the Germans to this nonetheless little recognized crime in Germany. “This initiative, nonetheless, should not fail over the controversy over whether or not the decision will embody the phrase” genocide “or whether or not it will be a” crime in opposition to humanity, “warns Gerhard Simon.

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