Thank You Letter to the Lev Kopelev Forum from the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group

Mr Thomas Roth
Chairman of the Board
Lew Kopelew Forum
Neumarkt 18, Neumarkt Passage
50667 Köln
www.kopelew-forum.de
Tel.: +49 221 257 67 67, Fax: +49 221 257 67 68

June 30, 2023

Dear Mr. Thomas Roth, dear friends and colleagues!

On behalf of the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group (KHPG) and from all of us, we express to you our sincere gratitude and deep appreciation for the high approval of our work and for awarding our Group (KHPG) the Lev Kopelev Prize for 2023.

We are especially pleased to receive this high award from you since we have always highly appreciated the great and multifaceted contribution made by Lev Kopelev to foster respect for human dignity, protect people from the cruelty of dictatorships, and promote political tolerance. No less significant was his contribution to the struggle for the individual’s freedom in all its senses, for the joy of human existence and peace, which is so topical for Ukraine today.

Humane universal values — this is what Lev Kopelev defended resolutely and continuously, regardless of citizenship and geography of presence. And this is indeed what the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group strives for in its daily work.

We have always highly valued the ideological, spiritual, and literary heritage of Lev Kopelev and his wife, Raisa Orlova, and we have done everything that was and is in our power to promote his recognition. From 2010 to 2018, our subsidiary publishing house, “Human Rights”, has given a new generation of readers most of their books.

Lev Kopelev possessed the universal talent of a humanist, which allowed and, at the same time, required him to believe in the possibility of reorganizing the European world even during the war, to promote philanthropy, and to protect the civilian population from cruelty, robbery and violence. The strength of his personality maintained the worldview of a free man who not only felt himself to be such but also behaved in any circumstances as an independent and clear-thinking person.

Your Forum today consistently defends the values this amazing writer, scientist, and human rights activist firmly believed in and defended. Your work does not allow even today to weaken the “powerful and unique voice of the author” (Vladimir Kornilov), whose moral position stayed in demand in the 21st century no less than in the 20th century.

That is why we are so happy to receive this high award and a symbol of recognition from your hands.

With sincere recognition and solidarity,

Executive Director of the KHPG
Yevhen Zakharov

Chairman of the KHPG Council
Vsevolod Rechytskyi