Community Meeting re. Independence Referendum Ukraine

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Community Meeting re. Independence Referendum Ukraine

Yorkshire Film Archive
Bradford
1991-03-12
Sound

1991 and the Act of Declaration of Independence of Ukraine

On 24 August 1991, the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR adopted the Act of Declaration of Independence of Ukraine (Akt proholoshennya nezalezhnosti Ukrayiny), re-establishing Ukraine as an independent state. A referendum on Ukrainian independence and the first direct Presidential election were held on 1 December 1991. 84% of the Ukrainian electorate took part in the referendum, with more than 90% voting in favour of independence.

Leonid Kravchuk was elected President from a group of six candidates. A week after his election, he and the Russian president Boris Yeltsin and Belarussian president Stanislav Shushkevich, signed the Belavezha Accords which declared that the Soviet Union had ceased to exist and it was officially dissolved on 26 December 1991. Since 1992, 24 August has been celebrated as Ukrainian Independence Day.

This is a section of a longer video featuring a community meeting about a referendum on Ukraine's independence from the Soviet Union. Here three letters are read: to John Major MP (English), Leonid Kuchma (Ukrainian) and Verkhovna Rada (Ukrainian).

Bradford Ukrainian Community Life

The largest and most active Ukrainian community in the UK diaspora thrives in Bradford.

Ukrainians have lived in Bradford since the end of the Second World War. The community was established by displaced Ukrainian men and women who came to the UK as displaced people from camps in West Germany and Austria under Westward Ho!, the European Volunteer Workers (EVWs) scheme. In Bradford, EVWs were placed into jobs in the textile industry to fill labour shortages and were initially housed in hostels and private rented accommodation. They were joined by members of the Ukrainian Army Division who came to the UK from camps in Italy. These early settlers founded the Bradford branch of the Association of Ukrainians in Great Britain (AUGB) in 1947, established other community organisations and worshipped in both the Ukrainian Greek Catholic (Uniate) and Orthodox faiths. This collection is a snapshot of the Ukrainian community which settled in Bradford and continues to be one of the largest and most active in the UK's Ukrainian diaspora.

10 videos in this collection