The process of the Union for Liberation of Ukraine (Ukrainian: Процес Спілки Визволення України, Protses Spilky Vyzvolennia Ukrayiny, SVU) was a court trial that is classified in the history as one of the show trials of the Soviet Union.
The event took place in the Opera Theatre in Kharkiv (at that time the Ukrainian State Central Opera) from March 9 to April 19, 1930. Forty-five (45) Ukrainian intellectuals, theologists, writers, and a librarian were accused in anti-state activities (counter-revolutionary classification was present there as well). Fifteen of who were blamed worked in the system of the All-Ukrainian Academy of Science, about thirty of them were members of former Ukrainian political parties, one person was a prime-minister, two others were the ministers of the Ukrainian People's Republic, other six - members of the Central Rada. Amongst those 45 two were of Jewish background and three others were females.
According to the Museum of Soviet Occupation this proceeding became some sort of a political slogan to charge against such Ukrainian forces which were represented in face of the older and foremost academical intelligentsia as well as the representative of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC).[1] One of the defendants was recalling that the Senior attorney of the secret department of Kiev okrug department of GPU Solomon Bruk during the interrogations was repeating: "We must put the Ukrainian intelligentsia on its knees, it is our duty and it will be executed; of whom we would not be able, we're going to shoot!" Soon after that 700 other people were arrested in connections with the process. The exact number is not know, but some estimation run around 30 thousands that were either arrested, exiled, and/or liquidated during and after the process.
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In Soviet sources the SVU was an underground organization which supposedly existed in Ukraine from June 1926 to July 1929, when it was exposed by the DPI. The SVU allegedly existed in the Ukrainian diaspora (it should not be confused with the Union of Liberation of Ukraine, which operated during World War II abroad).
According to the indictment, the SVU put the task of liberation of the Ukrainian people in all ethnographic Ukrainian territory and the establishment of an independent Ukrainian Republic, which had to be parliamentary and democratic, with a broad right of citizens to private property. The indictment alleges that the SVU was preparing popular uprisings, in close agreement with leaders of Ukrainian diaspora. In addition, the Union of Ukrainian Youth (SUM) was to organize terrorist acts against the Soviet Union, and Soviet Ukrainian leaders.
Among others in the dock were:
The Chairman of the Ukrainian Supreme Court who heard the case was Anton Prykhodko, the chief prosecutor M. Mykhailyk (Attorney-General of the Republic and Deputy Narkom). Among the public prosecutors were Panas Lіubchenko, academician A. Sokolovsky, writer O. Slisarenko.
On the side of the defendants were Ratner, Vilensky, Puhtynsky.
Among the defendants were three females: Liudmyla Starytska-Chernyakhivska, Liudmyla Bidnova, A. Tokarivska; two doctors - members UNAS, 15 professors of higher schools, two students, a director of a middle school, 10 teachers, a theologian and a priest of UAOC, three writers, five editors, two cooperators, two lawyers and a librarian; 15 defendants were employees of UNAS. Many defendants were united through political activities during the struggle for freedom (1917–1920): 31 of them were once members of the Ukrainian political parties (15 - UPSF, 12 - USDRP, 4 - UPSR), one was a prime minister, two - Ministers of the Ukrainian government, six - members of the Ukrainian Central Rada. According to the indictment act, 33 of the accused belonged to the Kiev group of SVU, three represented Dnipropetrovsk and Odessa, two - Poltava and Mykolaiv, and a single representation was from Chernihiv and Vinnytsia. Among the defendants were two Ukrainians of Jewish ethnicity: a historian Yosyp Germaize and a lawyer Morhulis.
The process had numerous inconsistencies. Leaders of the Ukrainian emigration strongly denied allegations from the investigation, that the emigration gave instructions. In particular, L. Chykalenko denied that he ever sent a letter of instruction to Yefremov. The existence of such a letter was also denied by J. Hermayze. N. Pavlushkova (sister of the defendant) argues that "SVU as an organization was the centre for a very narrow circle of people, not more than 12 - 15, without a strong organized periphery" and it recognized that the confessions at the trial of the defendants was forced.
Despite the Soviet SVU publicity process, the sentence was considered too moderate. According to K. Turkalo defendant, the prosecutor threatened 13 of the defendants with the Highest Degree of Penalty (VMN), but did not demand it. 4 convicted 45 defendants to 10 years imprisonment, in strict isolation, 6 - 8, 3 - 6, 10 - 5, 21 - 3 and 1 to 2 years, 10 of them received a suspended sentence and was immediately released 5 more were pardoned a few months. Some prisoners had been sent to the Solovetsky islands. In 1930 and during the first months of WWII many participants of the SVU were again arrested and disappeared. Most of the accused died in prison or in exile, only a few emigrated (K. Turkalo), and some were rehabilitated after World War II (V. Hantsov, V. Atamanovskyy).
In modern Ukrainian opinion, the dominant thought is that SVU and SUM did not exist as an organization, and were provocations of the DPI (V. Holubnychyy, V. Hryshko, M. Kowalewsky, G. Kostyuk, Yu. Lavrinenko, R. Sallivant, K. Turkalo, P. Fedak), however some sources recognize the existence of SVU (N. Pavlushkova, W. Ivy).
The hypothesis that SVU - SUM was a fictitious organization of the DPI is supported by the creation of other All-Union demonstration court processes (Shakhtinski process in 1928 or so-called Prompartia (Industrial Party) in December 1930), which were purely political.
It is more probable that the defendants in the SVU process were Ukrainian patriots, who actively worked for the Ukrainian national cultural renaissance in the 1920s, but they did so spontaneously, without creating any anti-Soviet political organization, with no directive from the Ukrainian emigration.