Арнольд Марголін, нота до Ліги Націй, Лондон, 13 квітня 1920
London, 13thApril,1920
In accordance with Article 1 of the Covenant of the League of Nations, and authorized thereto by the mandate of the Government of the Ukrainian Republic, under the presidency of Symon Petliura, and in the name of that Government, the Ukrainian Diplomatic Mission in the United Kingdom has the honour to transmit to the League of Nation to request for admission of the Ukrainian Republic as a member of the League of Nations.
In support of this request we have the honour to set forth the following brief historical survey:
The Ukraine was formerly for many centuries an independent and sovereign state, recognised as such by all the other European states. It was only since the XIV and following centuries that certain Ukrainian territories on the right bank of the Dnieper were conquered by the Poles. In the XVII centuries, however, Hetman [Bohdan] Khmelnitsky liberated these territories also from the Polish domination and re-united all the Ukrainian lands as one independent state. In 1654, the Ukraine voluntarily allied herself by the Treaty of Perejaslav with Russia as a sovereign and confederate state, accepting only the protectorate of the Tsar, but expressly reserving, by Articles VI and XIV of this Treaty, not only complete autonomy in its internal affaires, the free election of its Hetmans, but, more than that, the right of international and diplomatic relations. Later on, Russian absolutism succeeded in gradually annihilating all these prerogatives of independence and sovereignty and bringing the Ukraine under the Russian yoke. But this was done illegally, not only in contravention of all international and human rights, but also against the will of the Ukrainian people, which showed itself by several insurrections brutally suppressed by the Tsars.
In April, 1917, following the Russian Revolution, the Ukrainian National Congress, elected the Central Rada, as the Ukrainian Parliament, which was composed of 813 deputies from all the Ukrainian parties and also from all the national minorities (Great Russians, Jews, Poles, etc.). This Parliament confirmed the restoration of the Ukrainian State, and proclaimed the sovereignty of that State by the acts of 7th November, 1917, and of 9th January, 1918. In December, 1917, France and England accredited to the Ukrainian Republic certain diplomatic representatives, to wit General [Georges] Tabouis and Mister [Picton] Bagge, and by this act have recognised the Ukrainian Republic.
The Great Russian Soviet Government for its part also recognised the independence and sovereignty of the Ukraine, by the Decree of 4th December, 1917, published in its official gazette (No 26 of «Gazeta Vremenogo Robotschago i Krestjanskago Pravitelstva»); but at the same time it declared war on the Ukrainian Government, regarding it as a Bourgeo is Government. Threatened by invasion by the Bolsheviks, the Ukraine was constrained to conclude the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in February, 1918. In May, 1918, the Russian Soviet Government sent its representatives to Kiev, in order negotiate peace with the Ukrainian Government, and recognised anew the sovereignty of the Ukrainian Republic.
After the coup d’ètat of the German General-Staff at Kiev which dissolved the Central Rada and imposed on the country the Hetman [Pavlo] Skoropadsky, a federation of all the Ukrainian parties was formed at the end of 1918, and it instituted the Directory as a Provisional Government. After the fall of Hetman [Pavlo] Skoropadsky and of his supporters, the Directory convoked at Kiev, in January, 1919 the National Congress of representatives of the peasants and workmen of the Ukraine, which confirmed the Directory in its powers.
Despite the successive of the Ukraine by the Russian Bolsheviks, on the one hand, and by the Russian Volunteers of [Anton] Denikin, on the other hand, the entire Ukrainian population has and does always recognise the Government under the presidency of S[ymon] Petliura (President of the Directory) as its national Government. In any case the entire Ukrainian population has strikingly shown by the afore-mentioned facts, as well as by the sacrifices, of blood in its bitter combats against the Russian Bolsheviks and against the Russian Volunteers of [Anton] Denikin its steadfast will to be, and to remain, a sovereign State. Except for that part of its territory now occupied by the Russian Bolsheviks, the Ukrainian State governs itself freely, possesses its own army and its diplomatic representatives.
Seeing that the Ukrainian people owe their liberation from the yoke of absolutism and the re-birth of their sovereignty to the ideas which are the origin and form the basis of the very existence of the League of Nation, the Ukrainian Diplomatic Mission in the United Kingdom, on behalf of the Ukrainian Government, solemnly makes this declaration of the sincere intention of the Ukraine to observe all international engagements, even as we, on behalf of the Ukraine, fully accept the rules laid down by the League of Nations concerning our military and naval forces and armaments.
A[rnold] Margolin
Chief of the Mission
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Друкується за примірником Місії УНР у Швейцарії, машинопис / ЦДАВО України Ф. 4211. – Оп. 1. – Спр. 3. – Арк. 118-119.
Опубліковано
Архів Української Народної Республіки. Міністерство закордонних справ. Дипломатичні документи від Версальського до Ризького мирних договорів (1919–1921) / Упоряд.: Валентин Кавунник. – Київ: Інститут української археографії та джерелознавства ім. М. С. Грушевського, 2016. – С. 466-468.