Wiesenthal Center Protests Kiev March to Honor Birthday of Ukrainian Nazi Collaborator Stefan Bandera

Jerusalem-The Simon Wiesenthal Center today sent a letter of protest to the Ukrainian ambassador to Israel, Yevgen Korniychuk, in response to the mass march in Kiev on New Year'sDay of thousands of Ukrainians to mark the birthday of World War II Ukrainian leader Stefan Bandera, who collaborated with the Nazis and whose men actively participated in the mass murder ofthousands of Jews and other civilians.

The letter by the Center's director for Eastern European Affairs, Holocaust historian Dr. Efraim Zuroff, stressed the offensive message conveyed by the celebration of the birth of a personresponsible for the murder of thousands of innocent persons.

According to Dr. Zuroff:

"No self-respecting democracy would ever allow such manifestations of adulation for a collaborator with the Third Reich, who was responsible for the deaths of so many innocent people.

"Demonstrations like this are a blatant affront to the sensitivities of Ukrainian Jews and Jews the world over and clearly indicate that although Ukraine is a democracy, it has not succeeded ineliminating the deep-seated animus of some of its citizens towards Jews."

For additional information please contact the Israel Office of the Wiesenthal Center: Tel: 972-2-563-1274 or Tel: 972-50-721-4156, follow the Centeron Facebook, or @simonwiesenthal and @EZuroff for newsupdates sent directly to your Twitter feed.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center is one of the largest international Jewish human rights organizations with over 400,000 member families in the UnitedStates. It is an NGO at international agencies including the United Nations, UNESCO, the OSCE, the OAS, the Council of Europe and the Latin American Parliament (Parlatino).