دانلود کتاب Islands of Death

Semen Aleksandrovich Pidhainy was born on April 17th, 1907. A Kuban Cossack, he lived on the Kuban until he was 17 years of age. In 1922, the Communists shot his father, who had been taking an active part in the struggle for complete independence from Russia and the creation of a Kuban Cossack Republic in alliance with Ukraine. The rest of his family was liquidated by the Bolsheviks. Semen Pidhainy, by using forged identification certificates, escaped to Kiev and studied there at the University.

When he graduated in 1929, the GPU discovered his true identity. Only due to the intervention of Skrypnik, a powerful member of the Politburo did Mr. Pidhainy escape the slave camps. He went to Kharkiv and continued his studies, intending to become a professor. For some time he taught Ukrainian history as an assistant professor at the same university.

On January 17th, 1933 he was arrested by the GPU and accused of taking part in a Ukrainian underground organization called the Union of the Kuban and Ukraine. It was alleged that this society had intended to unite Ukraine and the Kuban Cossacks after separating them from Russia.

On August 8th, 1933 Pidhainy was condemned to eight years' hard labour on the Solovky Islands. In 1941, after serving his term, he was deprived of all civic rights, and after much trouble was allowed to live in the city of Isum. He was prohibited from leaving the city and was obliged to report weekly to the local GPU.

In August, 1941 he was arrested again but escaped to German territory. He returned to Kharkiv in November and worked as chief of the city welfare department. When the Communists occupied Ukraine in 1944 he escaped again to Germany and was placed in a German slave camp for refugees.

After the defeat of Germany Pidhainy was active in the organizing of a Ukrainian democratic party which was striving for the liberation of Ukraine. As a representative of that party, he became a member of the Ukrainian Government in exile.

Now in Canada, he is the President of the Ukrainian Association of Victims of Russian Communist Terror, and he is known as a gifted author and leader.