KIEV, January 1 (Itar-Tass) —— The Ukrainian nationalists started a torch march in memory of leader of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists Stepan Bandera in downtown Kiev. The march is organized by the nationalistic party Svoboda, which succeeded to elect its deputies in the Verkhovna Rada, Ukraine’s parliament, for the first time.
No less than 2,000 people are participating in the march. They are chanting the slogan “Glory to Ukraine!” The marchers are carrying the posters saying “Bandera will come to establish the order” and “The heroes are not dying”.
The events, which are related with Stepan Bandera (1909-1959), were held in the Carpathian Region at the historical memorial museum in Stary Ugrynov, in Ivano-Frankovsk at the monument to Bandera and other cities in western Ukrainian regions on Tuesday.
Ideologist of the Ukrainian nationalistic movement in the twentieth century Bandera, who was collaborating with the Nazi Germany during the Second World War, is taken quite ambiguously in the modern Ukrainian society. The assessments of his activities range from absolutely positive in several western Ukrainian regions to sharply negative opinions in other Ukrainian regions. In 2010 the then Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko awarded Bandera with the title of the Hero of Ukraine, but in the same year the Donetsk administrative court cancelled this decision, finding it unlawful. Yushchenko filed an appeal, which the Donetsk court of appeal did not satisfy as well. The Ukrainian Supreme Administrative Court upheld the verdicts of the Donetsk courts in 2011.