Yurii-Bohdan Romanovych Shukhevych (, 28 March 1933 – 22 November 2022) was a Ukrainian

far-right Far-right politics, often termed right-wing extremism, encompasses a range of ideologies that are marked by ultraconservatism, authoritarianism, ultranationalism, and nativism. This political spectrum situates itself on the far end of the ...

politician. A member of the

Ukrainian Helsinki Group The Ukrainian Helsinki Group () was founded on November 9, 1976, as the Ukrainian Public Group to Promote the Implementation of the Helsinki Accords on Human Rights () to monitor human rights in Ukraine. The group was active until 1981 when all ...

, he was a

political prisoner A political prisoner is someone imprisoned for their political activity. The political offense is not always the official reason for the prisoner's detention. There is no internationally recognized legal definition of the concept, although ...

and the son of

Roman Shukhevych Roman-Taras Osypovych Shukhevych (, also known by his pseudonym, Tur and Taras Chuprynka; 30 June 1907 – 5 March 1950) was a Ukrainian nationalism, Ukrainian nationalist and a military leader of the nationalist Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) ...

. He was a long-serving leader of the

Ukrainian National Assembly – Ukrainian National Self Defence Ukrainian may refer or relate to: * Ukraine, a country in Eastern Europe * Ukrainians, an East Slavic ethnic group native to Ukraine * Demographics of Ukraine * Ukrainian culture, composed of the material and spiritual values of the Ukrainian peopl ...

. Shukhevych spent over 30 years in the Soviet prisons and concentration camps. In the

2014 Ukrainian parliamentary election Fourteen or 14 may refer to: * 14 (number), the natural number following 13 and preceding 15 * one of the years 14 BC, AD 14, 1914, 2014 Music * 14th (band), a British electronic music duo * ''14'' (David Garrett album), 2013 *''14'', an un ...

Shukhevych was elected into the

Ukrainian parliament The Verkhovna Rada ( ; VR), officially the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, is the unicameral parliament of Ukraine. It consists of 450 deputies presided over by a speaker. The Verkhovna Rada meets in the Verkhovna Rada building in Ukraine's capi ...

for Radical Party.

Early life

Yurii Shukhevych was born on 28 March 1933, in the town of Ohladów,

Lwów Voivodeship Lwów Voivodeship () was an administrative unit of interwar Poland (1918–1939). Because of the Nazi invasion of Poland in accordance with the secret Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, it became occupied by both the Wehrmacht and the Red Army in Septem ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

(now Ohliadiv,

Lviv Oblast Lviv Oblast (, ), also referred to as Lvivshchyna (, ), is an administrative divisions of Ukraine, oblast in western Ukraine. The capital city, capital of the oblast is the city of Lviv. The current population is History Name The region is named ...

of Ukraine). He is the son of

, a commander of the

Ukrainian Insurgent Army The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (, abbreviated UPA) was a Ukrainian nationalist partisan formation founded by the Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) on 14 October 1942. The UPA launched guerrilla warfare against Nazi Germany, the S ...

. In 1944, when the

West Ukraine Western Ukraine or West Ukraine (, ) refers to the western territories of Ukraine. There is no universally accepted definition of the territory's boundaries, but the contemporary Ukrainian administrative regions ( oblasts) of Chernivtsi, I ...

was re-occupied by the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army, often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Republic and, from 1922, the Soviet Union. The army was established in January 1918 by a decree of the Council of People ...

, he was arrested with his mother and sent to

Siberia Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...

. In 1946 Shukhevych was taken away from his mother to an orphanage for children of

enemies of the people The terms enemy of the people and enemy of the nation are designations for the political opponents and the social-class opponents of the power group within a larger social unit, who, thus identified, can be subjected to political repression. ...

Donets Basin The Seversky Donets () or Siverskyi Donets (), usually simply called the Donets (), is a river on the south of the East European Plain. It originates in the Central Russian Upland, north of Belgorod, flows south-east through Ukraine (Kharkiv ...

. He ran away twice back home, but later was taken back again. Arrested when he was 15 years old, Shukhevych was accused of being a member of the OUN-UPA, the nationalist underground organization that his father commanded. After he turned 16, in 1949, he was sentenced to 10 years in the

Vladimir Central Prison Vladimir Prison, popularly known as Vladimir Central (), is a prison in Vladimir, Russia. It is the largest prison in Russia, with a capacity of 1,220 detainees, and is operated by the Federal Penitentiary Service as a maximum-security prison ...

. When his father was killed in action, in 1950, Yuri, now aged 17, was taken from Vladimir prison to Lviv to identify the corpse. He was released under an amnesty in 1954, after the death of

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Dzhugashvili; 5 March 1953) was a Soviet politician and revolutionary who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until Death and state funeral of Joseph Stalin, his death in 1953. He held power as General Secret ...

, but the USSR Procurator General ordered that he be sent back to prison to complete his sentence. On the day of his release, in 1958, he was rearrested, charged with having conducted "anti-soviet agitation" in prison, and sentenced to another ten years, in a labor camp in

Mordovia Mordovia ( ),; Moksha language, Moksha and officially the Republic of Mordovia,; ; is a republics of Russia, republic of Russia, situated in Eastern Europe. Its capital city, capital is the types of inhabited localities in Russia, city of S ...

. After his release in August 1968, he was forbidden to live in Ukraine. He settled in

Nalchik Nalchik (, ; ; ) is the capital city of Kabardino-Balkaria, Russia, situated at an altitude of in the foothills of the Caucasus Mountains; about northwest of Beslan (Beslan is in the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania). It covers an area of ...

, in the North Caucasus, married, had two children, worked as an electrician, and wrote an account of his 20 years in prison. In February 1972, he was arrested in Nalchik after anti-soviet literature was discovered during a police raid on his rooms and handed over to the

KGB The Committee for State Security (, ), abbreviated as KGB (, ; ) was the main security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. It was the direct successor of preceding Soviet secret police agencies including the Cheka, Joint State Polit ...

in Kyiv, then sent back to Nalchik, and sentenced to another nine years in labor camps, followed by five in exile. In 1973, he wrote a letter to the UN from a labor camp in

, for which another year was added to his sentence. He was held in Vladimir Prison, then transferred to the Tatar prison. During his time as a prisoner, Shukhevych went blind. After he had completed his prison sentence, in 1983, he was exiled to Siberia, and kept in a nursing home in Tomsk. He was allowed to return to his native Lviv in 1988, at the age of 55, after 44 years of absence.

Political career

In December 1990 Shukhevych was elected as head of far-right paramilitary organization Ukrainian National Assembly which itself was renamed

(UNA-UNSO) in September 1991.The radical right in Central and Eastern Europe since 1989
by

Sabrina Ramet Sabrina Petra Ramet (born 26 June 1949) is an American academic, educator, editor and journalist. She specializes in Eastern European history and politics and is a Professor of Political Science at the Norwegian University of Science and Technolo ...

Pennsylvania University Press The University of Pennsylvania Press, also known as Penn Press, is a university press affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. History The press was originally incorporated with b ...

. 1999 (page 290 and continuing from there) Shukhevych failed to register as a candidate in the

1991 Ukrainian presidential election Presidential elections were held in Ukraine on 1 December 1991,Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) ''Elections in Europe: A data handbook'', p1976 the first direct presidential elections in the country's history. Leonid Kravchuk, the Chairman ...

because of a failure to collect 100,000 signatures. In the

1994 Ukrainian parliamentary election The year 1994 was designated as the "International Year of the Family" and the "International Year of Sport and the Olympic Charter, Olympic Ideal" by the United Nations. In the Line Islands and Phoenix Islands of Kiribati, 1994 had only 364 ...

Shukhevych failed to win after receiving no more than 7.44% of the votes in

single-member districts A single-member district or constituency is an electoral district represented by a single officeholder. It contrasts with a multi-member district, which is represented by multiple officeholders. In some countries, such as Australia and India ...

in Zolochiv.Short bio
, LB In August 1994 Shukhevych retired from active political life because of health problems and relationships with other leaders of the party had finally deteriorated. Early 2006 Shukhevych returned to politics and entered in the electoral list of the UNA-UNSO for the March 2006 Ukrainian parliamentary election at number 1. The party, however, lost the election and gained no more than 0.06% of the total votes. The party did not participate in the

2007 elections The following elections occurred in the year 2007. * Electoral calendar 2007 * Elections in 2007 * 2007 United Nations Security Council election Africa * 52nd National Conference of the African National Congress * 2007 Algerian legislative elect ...

.Results of elections of 1998, 2002, 2006 and 2007 for UNA-UNSO
DA-TA On 19 August 2006, Shukhevych was awarded the title

Hero of Ukraine A Hero of Ukraine (HOU; ) is the highest national decoration that can be conferred upon an individual citizen by the president of Ukraine. The decoration was created in 1998 by President Leonid Kuchma. As of 6 June 2025, the total number of re ...

"for civil courage, long-term social, political and human rights activities in the name of independence of Ukraine". In October 2006 UNA-UNSO re-elected Shukhevych as its chairman. And again did so in June 2010. In February 2014 Shukhevych signed a petition that asked to respect the

Russian language Russian is an East Slavic languages, East Slavic language belonging to the Balto-Slavic languages, Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family. It is one of the four extant East Slavic languages, and is ...

and Russian-speaking citizens of Ukraine lifestyle "so they do not feel like strangers in Ukraine". In October 2014 Shukhevych was removed from his post as UNA-UNSO chairman due to the fact that he had agreed to run for the parliamentary elections for

Radical Party of Oleh Liashko The Radical Party of Oleh Liashko (; RPL), formerly known as the Ukrainian Radical-Democratic Party (), is a political party in Ukraine. It was registered in September 2010. It was primarily known for its radical populism, especially in 2014, whe ...

. In the

Shukhevych as a candidate (placed 5th on the party list) of Radical Party was elected into the

.Ukraine's Radical Party of Oleh Lyashko: Facts and Details

RIA Novosti RIA Novosti (), sometimes referred to as RIAN () or RIA (), is a Russian state-owned domestic news agency. On 9 December 2013, by a decree of Vladimir Putin, it was liquidated and its assets and workforce were transferred to the newly created ...

(25 October 2014) In 2015 he was instrumental in the drafting and passing of the

Ukrainian decommunization laws Ukrainian decommunization laws were passed in 2015, in the early stages of the Russo-Ukrainian War. These laws relate to decommunization as well as commemoration of Ukrainian history, and have been referred to as " memory laws". They outlawed the ...

. He died in

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

in the night of 21 to 22 November 2022, where he was undergoing medical treatment.

References

External links

Yurii ShukhevychYurii Shukhevych escaped to father from special building
Krayina. 28 July 2012 *Recollections of Yurii Shukhevych about himself and his father Roman Shukhevych
Part I
an
Part II
in interview with

Dmytro Gordon Dmytro (, ) is a Ukrainian name, derived from the Greek Demetrios. Nicknames Nicknames of the name Dmytro include: * Dima (; most common) *Dimochka (Дімочка) *Dimulia (Дімуля) *Dimusha (Дімуша) *Dimusia (Дімуся) *Dmytry ...

on pages of newspaper "Gordon Boulevard" {{DEFAULTSORT:Shukhevych, Yurii 1933 births 2022 deaths Politicians from Lviv Oblast People from Lwów Voivodeship Ukrainian human rights activists Recipients of the title of Hero of Ukraine Recipients of the Order of State Ukrainian nationalists Ukrainian anti-communists Eighth convocation members of the Verkhovna Rada Radical Party of Oleh Liashko politicians Ukrainian National Assembly – Ukrainian People's Self-Defence politicians Soviet dissidents Ukrainian dissidents Soviet prisoners and detainees Ukrainian Helsinki Group Blind politicians Ukrainian blind people Ukrainian independence activists Shukhevych family Ukrainian politicians with disabilities Soviet blind people Blind activists