A contentious monument honoring Ukrainian soldiers who were part of a Nazi group during World War II has been taken down from a cemetery in Canada after several years of criticism from community organizations who deemed it to be hurtful and unacceptable.
On Saturday, the cenotaph in the privately owned St Volodymyr Ukrainian cemetery in Oakville, Ontario was taken down.
The monument, built in 1988, honored the First Ukrainian Division, also called the Waffen-SS “Galicia” Division or the SS 14th Waffen Division, a group of volunteers who served under the Nazis.
For many years, the cenotaph has caused conflict between Canada’s Ukrainian community – many of whom endured Stalin’s effort to starve them and strongly oppose the Soviet Union – and the Jewish and Polish communities, who view the cenotaph as a memorial to a Nazi group that is believed to have committed extensive killings.
In June of 2020, the phrase “Nazi war monument” was painted on the cenotaph. In recent months, its infamy has grown due to visits from white supremacist groups.
The Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centre welcomed the “elimination, albeit overdue” of a memorial that “honoured and glorified individuals who served in a Nazi military unit and were complicit in war crimes committed during the Holocaust, ultimately distorting Holocaust history”.
However, a later statement from the cemetery claimed that the monument was being moved for repair purposes, leaving doubts about the temporary nature of the removal.
The office of the cemetery in Oakville, known as St. Volodymyr Ukrainian Cemetery, stated in an email that the monument honoring the Veterans of the First Ukrainian Division has been vandalized multiple times in recent years.
“The monument suffered significant damage from vandals in the recent past. After careful thought and discussions with the descendants of the division (who are also the owners of the monument), it was concluded that the monument should be taken down for repairs to be made.”
A notice was placed at the location specifying that the memorial was taken down for maintenance.
According to Rabbi Stephen Wise, head of the Shaarei-Beth El Congregation in Oakville, the removal was final and irreversible.
“According to Wise’s statement to the Guardian, the upward trend will not continue. Despite previous suggestions, he emphasizes that there will be no change in direction.”
It was stated by Wise that the choice was made after extensive and challenging deliberations with the Ukrainian community regarding the statue.
“We discussed the significance of this monument to each group and came up with a solution to move forward,” said Wise. “To their credit, they took the time to listen to us and now the issue has been resolved.”
The recent elimination of the memorial has brought attention to Canada’s complex history of resettling Ukrainian nationalists who had close connections to the Nazis.
Following the war, a large number of Ukrainians migrated to Canada. However, potential ties to the Nazis were largely disregarded due to the onset of the Cold War, according to Ivan Katchanovski, a professor of political science at the University of Ottawa.
The group went unnoticed due to the fact that most were unaware that the First Ukrainian Division was simply a rebranded version of the SS 14th Waffen Division.
In September, the Canadian parliament’s speaker stepped down after extending an invitation to a 98-year-old veteran from the 14th Division to be a part of a special session while Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, was visiting.
Two other statues commemorating Nazi collaborators remain in Canada, but Wise said the removal of the Oakville shrine was a hard-won victory which reflected the value of honest discussion between groups.
Wise stated that it has been a lengthy struggle, but ultimately, they are content. They do not feel that a monument to Nazi ideals should be present on Canadian land.
Source: theguardian.com
