The 91^st anniversary of Ukraine’s Reunion

celebrated by Ukrainian diplomats and the Ukrainian American community

January 22, 2010 – Ukrainian diplomats from the Embassy in Washington D.C., Permanent Mission to the UN and Consular General in New York along with members of the Ukrainian-American community gathered at the Ukrainian Educational and Cultural Center in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania, to celebrate the 91^st anniversary of the Ukrainian People’s Republic (UNR) and the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic (ZUNR) historic union and to pay tribute to the memory of Longyn Tsegelsky.

The reunion of 1919 was a powerful event leaving a deep historical mark on the memory of all Ukrainians as evidenced in 1991 with Ukraine’s regained independence. The thirty-million-people nation at that time, which had been divided for centuries, regained its freedom and independence.

Longyn Tsegelsky was a prominent Ukrainian political activist, diplomat, lawyer, journalist and publisher, one of the leaders of the ZUNR and author of the Reunion Act between ZUNR and UNR. Born in Lviv, he devoted his whole life to the goal of Ukraine’s independence. In 1918 L.Tsegelsky became Secretary of Internal Affairs of the Western Ukrainian People’s Republic. Soon afterwards he wrote the text of the Reunion Act and had the honor to read out its text at Kyiv’s Sofia Square.

L.Tsegelsky represented the government of UNR in the USA in 1920-1921 and stayed there after the creation of the USSR. He played an important role in political and cultural life of Ukrainian American community being one of the founders of the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America.