Prime Minister Harper’s Visit to Ukraine

PM Statement at Ukrainian Catholic University

Lviv, Ukraine (October 26, 2010) Prime Minister Stephen Harper made the following remarks at the Ukrainian Catholic University [excerpts from original]:

“When Ukraine first declared independence in 1991, the first Western country to recognize your status as a sovereign independent country was Canada.  And you might ask why were we so quick to do that?

“We heaved an enormous sigh of relief when Soviet communism was finally and irrefutably discredited.  The communist ideology had purported to be the cure for all that ails humanity.  It had just one problem.  Before it could work its miracles, it had to jail or kill every living soul who disagreed.  And so millions were murdered and millions more were starved.  It is a past that must not be forgotten, that must never be swept under the carpet.

“Besides the bonds of kinship that exist between Canada and Ukraine, there are important values and principles to promote.  As Canadians, we believe that a government must work in the interests of its people, not the other way around.  We believe that countries which respect the rights of their own people are more likely to respect the rights of other nations and to be good world citizens.

“And we believe that countries where citizens know what their governments are doing and can hold them accountable are less likely to make war on their neighbours than those were power is the possession of an exclusive ruling class responsible to nobody… If peace is your goal, then a free and democratic society is the way to go.

“Therefore, the cornerstone of Canada’s foreign policy is the promotion of such values: freedom, democracy, human rights and the rule of law, and all the institutions that come with them: property rights, an impartial judiciary, and above all, freedom of expression and a free press.  The freedom for which Gongadze became a hero.

“In fact, we do not believe that you can have any one of these things… But the first is freedom.  So that when Ukraine rejoined the brotherhood of the free, we in Canada were among the first to cheer.

For ultimately what your country becomes, how it responds to the turns of future history and how you live as citizens, all this will be up to you and your generation.  You have great things ahead of you, great things to decide.  A whole destiny to shape.

“As you set about your life’s work, remember that in Canada, you have friends.  Friends who respect and admire Ukraine’s heart for freedom, its spirit of national self-determination, and the courage of its people, a courage that has never deserted you, even in the darkest nights of your long history.

Written in Visitor’s Book of the Memorial Museum Dedicated to the Victims of Occupying Regimes “Tyiurma na Lontskoho” (Lonsky Prison):

 “This is a grim and moving symbol of Ukraine’s oppression. It is important that the terrible things here not be forgotten or repeated. We are reminded that the heart can be broken, the body can be destroyed but the spirit of the oppressed is eternal and grows stronger.”

 Signature of Stephen Harper

Prime Minister of Canada

Lviv, October 26, 2010