ГУЛаг Палестины

you used the opportunity of your broadcast to defend Ukrainians against their

oppressors, Volodymyr Katelnytsky would be alive today.

Lubomyr Prytulak

cc: Yaakov Bleich, Ed Bradley, Jeffrey Fager, Don Hewitt, Steve Kroft, Andy Rooney,

Lesley Stahl, Mike Wallace, Simon Wiesenthal.

Morley Safer Letter 11 30Jun99 Who murdered Vadim Boyko?

We cannot believe that his death was just pure accident; although it is reported that

8,000 people a year in the former Soviet Union die due to their television sets exploding,

we all believe that Vadim would have survived this kind of accident.

June 30, 1999

Morley Safer

60 Minutes, CBS Television

51 W 52nd Street

New York, NY

USA 10019

Morley Safer:

The conclusion that you offered in your 23Oct94 60 Minutes broadcast The Ugly Face of

Freedom was that Ukraine is a place where Jews and Russians are oppressed by militant

Ukrainian nationalists, and where they are the targets of Ukrainian violence. The

closest that you came to substantiating this claim was to broadcast Rabbi Bleich's

allegation that an elderly Jewish couple had been attacked and robbed somewhere in

Western Ukraine. However, this allegation was devoid of substantiating detail, and my

request for specifics (both in my letter to you of 24May98, and in my letter to Rabbi

Bleich of 23May98) was answered with silence. I repeat that request to you now - please

inform me of the details of this attack, which minimally would include the time, the

place, the names of the victims, and the address where a police report is available. If

you do not have such information, please retract the allegation.

You must be aware that I. M. Levitas, Head of the Jewish Council of Ukraine as well as

of the Nationalities Associations of Ukraine has questioned whether such an attack on

the two elderly Jews ever took place. Levitas's doubt was first expressed in an open

letter to you, and I reminded Rabbi Bleich of it in my letter to him of 23May98, of

which you were mailed a copy. In view of I. M. Levitas's doubt, and in view of your and

Rabbi Bleich's silence in response to my request for particulars, the impression grows

daily stronger that you and Rabbi Bleich made the incident up.

The chief purpose of the present letter is to demonstrate to you yet again that your

conclusion which I summarize in my first sentence at the beginning of the present letter

is exactly backward. Ukraine is not a place where Ukrainians attack and murder, it is a

place where Ukrainians are attacked and murdered, as has been the case for the last

three hundred years, at least. Below is documented one further instance in support of

this conclusion. It is the story of Vadim Boyko, member of parliament, and popular

television investigative journalist. I would have expected that the story of Vadim

Boyko would have appealed to you, and for that reason that you might have included it in

any broadcast that you prepared about Ukraine, as his life - at least up to the final

moments - was not unlike your own:

February 23, 1992

Journalist's notebook in Ukraine

by Marta Kolomayets

Kiev Press Bureau

A colleague's tragic death

"He was a man engaged to a young Ukraine," said Volodymyr Yavorivsky, as

he bid farewell to Vadim Boyko, who died tragically on February 14, at

the age of 29.

Hundreds of mourners crowded into the third floor atrium of the

Ukrainian State Television and Radio headquarters, tearfully passing

each other on the steps Vadim so often bounded, rushing to the studios

where he recorded his popular television programs.

Now, on February 17, the mourners paid their last respects to Vadik (as

he was affectionately known), searching for a reason why such a

promising, talented life was cut short. As slow dirge-like music played

over the loudspeakers, they filed past the closed coffin, sewn up in

black cotton and laden with bunches of carnations of all colors.

At the foot of the coffin stood a black and white photo of the young

journalist and politician. An enlarged copy of the same photo,

decorated with a black mourning band, hung above the coffin. To the

left, the newly adopted Ukrainian national flag, also decorated with

black bunting, kept guard over its native son. Wreaths from the

Ukrainian Parliament, co-workers and friends surrounded the coffin.

Perhaps as a carryover from the Communist-atheist state of the past, the

wake of devoid of all Christian symbols and rites.

Vadim's father sat at the foot of the coffin, numb to the proceedings.

As a few speakers addressed the crowd, he wiped tears away from his

weary, red eyes. Vadim's mother was too weak to make the trip from the

family's home in Svitlovodsk to Kiev.

Mykola Okhmakevych, the stagnant, Communist head of the State Television

and Radio, whose removal has been pressed for by both democratic

deputies and workers of the television station, said a few uninspiring

words. Often harshly criticized by Vadim and his colleagues, Mr.

Okhmakevych now spoke of how Vadim had always loved his job. An angry

mourner, who saw this hypocrisy, cried out: "He loved Ukraine above