I still really want to know how this even happened. It’s disgraceful, and makes Canada as a whole look bad. Who first brought up this guy’s name as a potential invite? Did no one check his background, or was it intentional?
There’s absolutely zero evidence that anyone knew before he was invited. And after it was revealed, not one political figure in Canada has said something along the lines of “good people on both sides”.
As a Canadian sure it’s a guff, and the guy paid a price for his mistake and didn’t fight it, but compared to America I’ll take shit like this 8 days a week.
Yeah I’m sure the speaker couldn’t wait to be ridiculed and resign. Intentional career highlight for sure.
I’m also wondering what was going through the veterans mind. Did he just think the world was now honouring nazis? Did he think they knew or didn’t know? Why didn’t he decline??
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Well when you support Nazis, is it really that surprising that people would call you out for supporting Nazis?
Pretty sure the being called out part isn’t the bit he was confused about.
Purged by creator
Everything stops after that right? There can be no saving grace for someone who was in the SS.
There are some rare cases where where individuals would breifly join SS divisions, specifically to fight the Soviets rather than due to alligence to the Nazi ideology. Larry Throne is a notable example. The First Galician seems to have had a significant number focused on fighting the Soviets in a similar matter, although elements of the division did commit atrocities in Poland. Canada’s 1986 investigation into the division after the war concluded that there wasn’t sufficient evidence to condem the whole group
Of course, “not found guilty” doesn’t mean innocent. My point is purely addressing the, “There can be no saving grace for someone who was in the SS.” I still think this is a ridiculous situation, that he should not have been invited unless they can confirm with great certainty that he was not a supporter of the Nazi ideology and did not commit any crimes. If they can’t even check what division he served in, clearly anything more is outside their ability. Hopefully he is investigated properly given the spotlight, and extradited if needed.
Edit: Worth noting that this was a Ukranian division after the Holodomor. Its no wonder that many would be willing to join a war against the country that had murdered millions of their people already. For scale, its estimated that the Holodomor killed 3-5 times as many as the holocost in Ukrane.
Honestly if you signed up with the SS specifically to fight the Soviets, that is actually worse.
The news is true:
What happened is that this man was presented as Ukrainian war veteran
Canada has become embroiled in an escalating political controversy after members of its House of Commons were encouraged to join in a standing ovation for an individual who fought in Ukraine with a Nazi military unit accused of war crimes during the second world war.
The ovation took place shortly after Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, delivered an address to the parliament on Friday, when the assembly’s speaker, Anthony Rota, called lawmakers’ attention to 98-year-old Yaroslav Hunka, whom he described as a “war hero” who fought for the First Ukrainian Division.
But later according to Rota, he learned about his Nazi history. That eventually led to Rota’s resignation
At the weekend, Rota issued a statement apologising for what occurred. “In my remarks following the address of the president of Ukraine, I recognised an individual in the gallery. I have subsequently become aware of more information which causes me to regret my decision to do so,” he said.
How did the decision makers who set this stunt up think it was going to play out?
Woops, but WTF. How does anyone screw up that bad?
Guess they believed Putlers storyline about Ukraine being full of Nazis.
The story of fascist Ukraine is bullshit, but there is some right wing populism potential in the government and some people there. But show me a country that doesn’t have that problem
Then there is the normalization of nationalism, also pretty normal whilst being attacked as a country.
But the asow brigade for example are an extreme right militia group. And they are national heroes now. Not good!
I thought that is what I said.
Oh goodie, more hexbear accounts to ban!
Sorry sweatie but this is lemmy.ml not shittyworks.
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