An investigation by The Canada Files has found the Liberal MP Yvan Baker is not the only member of his family who can’t condemn the honouring of a Nazi SS division. In fact, his mother, Myroslava Oleksiuk, has gone further by denouncing Oakville’s Mayor Rob Burton for condemning a Nazi SS division memorial in Oakville, back in 2020.
Previously, The Canada Files found MP Baker had been either directly adjacent to or attended three UCC honourings of the Waffen SS 14th Division between 2007 to 2021 and wouldn’t condemn them, and had not condemned Canadian parliament’s standing ovations to Ukrainian Nazi Jaroslav Hunka, nor apologized for himself applauding Hunka with other parliamentarians.
The activism of MP Baker’s mother is another piece in the puzzle, of figuring out what has driven him to consistently refuse to condemn the Waffen SS 14th Division or the honouring of it.
A 2014 Eesti Elu article introduces Oleksiuk as “one of the co-founders of the Central and Eastern European Council in Canada”, in 2008. Yet this is not Oleksiuk’s most notable act of the decade.
At the start of the decade, 2000, Olekiuk founded a newsletter called ePOSHTA (also referred to as ‘E-Poshta’), whose purpose is made clear by an advertisement put in the Ukrainian Golf Association of Canada (UGAC). At the time of this advertisement in the UGAC, Oleksiuk was a member of the “Committee for Justice” of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress’ Toronto branch. This likely has much to do with how Liberal MP Yvan Baker first joined the UCC and found the desire to run for a VP position within the branch.
The academic John-Paul Himka explained in a 2006 journal article, “she [Oleksiuk] indicates that a primary purpose of the newsletter [ePOSHTA] is to defend older Ukrainians like John Demjanjuk against deportation and to defend the reputation of Division Galizien.” (more...)
MP Yvan Baker’s mother denounced Oakville Mayor for condemning Nazi division memorial
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