WW II Ukrainian War Criminals in Canada?

Olya Odynsky - A Personal Perspective

By Vicki Karpiak

On May 16, 2012 one of the more recently re-established Ukrainian National Federation of Canada branches, UNF Ottawa Gatineau, experienced one of its largest attended events, with participants coming to hear the personal reflections of Olya Odynsky, daughter of Wasyl Odynsky.

Emil Baran, Canada’s first diplomat to Ukraine in the early 1990s, and his wife Olena were in the audience. They stated: “It is very difficult to capture the essence and present the details of a story as complicated as this, and still keep the audience interested and emotionally involved.  Olya succeeded magnificently!  Her one-hour presentation was compelling, articulate, passionate, and you could hear a pin drop as she carefully laid out the facts in a masterful way, in defence of her father.  She let the facts make the case.” 

This is a story of a 15-year struggle of one family against the vast resources of the Government of Canada. In brief, Wasyl Odynsky was accused by the government of being a Nazi collaborator during WWII, and the intent was to take away his citizenship and deport him.  The fact that the charges were extremely vague and unspecified made the preparation of the defence very difficult.  With limited family resources, Olya proceeded to organize her father’s defence.

Ms. Odynsky described in compelling detail, the action taken against the vague charges, the rigid government bureaucracy and the prejudice.  She faced an army of government lawyers and seemingly limitless resources. In the end, although financially and emotionally exhausted, the family won the case and her father retained his Canadian Citizenship.

For 15 years, Mr. Odynsky and his family were caught in a judicial process that resulted in their lives being put on hold.  When one trial was won, another one quickly took its place, until finally Mr. Odynsky was acquitted last year.  The B’nai B’rith Organization was asked to pay back all court costs.

Olya Odynsky is a petit, dynamic, resolute and very positive woman!   During these 15 years, her father suffered serious health problems with a double heart by-pass and cancer; she kept the family spirits high, always believing that he would be acquitted.

Is the family bitter?  Olya Odynsky, in a CHIN radio interview with Irena Bell from the Ukrainian Program, quietly states that something positive always comes out of every negative circumstance.  Olya was able to take a judicial tribunal, at great personal expense, to the small village in Ukraine where her father grew up as a teenage Ukrainian boy with a Grade 4 education.  It was Olya’s first trip to Ukraine and it helped the judges have a perspective they would never have had in the court rooms.  Ms. Odynsky has learned more about the judicial system through her first hand experience than most Canadians might have learned in their text book studies,

After the presentation on May 16, I solicited this comment from Andriy Teliszewsky who states: “My wife and I were very much moved by Olya’s presentation.  Yes, she should write a book about this family ordeal!  I was especially moved by her recollection of her time with the elderly gentleman in her dad’s village and his statement that Odynsky not only lost his childhood during the war years, but he lost his future”.

We thank Olya for sharing this painful experience for the first time in public.  We commend her courage and perseverance over the years.  Now it is time for a book or a film to be made about the Odynsky Story, a 15-year fight!

Vicki Karpiak is Vice President of the UNF Ottawa Gatineau Branch and UCBPA – Executive Member

PHOTO

L. to R.: Christine and Roman Hruby, Olya Odynsky, Vicki Karpiak