Security Service of Ukraine “SBU” (SSU) plans to declassify documents that prove the systematic repression of the UGCC during the USSR

Ukrainian state archives contain over 1000 documents that confirm the involvement of top authority figures of the Communist Party of the USSR in the planned elimination of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church. Deputy chief of national archives of the SBU, Serhiy Kokin, said in an interview with “German Wave” that the majority of these will be declassified in the near future. Prior to this decision, a letter written by former leader of the Communist Party of the USSR, Nikita Khrushchev, to Joseph Stalin about the liquidation of the "uniatska" church was recently discovered and is widely believed to be authentic. Moreover, Kokin is convinced that a second or third copy of this letter was kept in the Central Record Office of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, which was once the party archive of Central Committee of the Ukrainian Communist Party.  "It is possible to confirm by analyzing the text whether the copy is authentic or not. The first copy went to Moscow, and the second one remained here," observed Kokin. Researchers claim that the archives of the SBU contain many documents testifying to the systematic elimination of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic church. Historians have already had access to 240 declassified documents, that were made by state security workers of the USSR who spied on priests, interrogated them, tortured and through these methods gathered information and wrote reports for Khrushchev, explained Kokin. He is certain that the historical truth about the attempted elimination of the "uniatska" church must be made public knowledge. However, he is not sure whether it will be possible to begin a criminal investigation based on this newly publicized evidence and to try those responsible. The deputy chief of the national archives of the Security Service of Ukraine believes that this would be a job for professional lawyers. "Liquidation of the national church, as declared by Raphael Lemkin, is an example of genocide, because it was directed against a certain group of people. There remains a question – why the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church was targeted specifically, when other confessions remained?" asked Kokin.

www.pravda.com.ua/news/2009/8/5/99421.htm