Viacheslav Chornovil

Viacheslav Chornovil
В'ячеслав Чорновіл
Chornovil in 1998
Chairman of the Lviv Oblast Council
In office April 1990 – April 1992
Preceded by	Position established
Succeeded by	Mykola Horyn
People's Deputy of Ukraine
In office 15 May 1990 – 26 March 1999
Constituency	People's Movement of Ukraine, Lviv Oblast, No. 264 (1990–1994)[1] People's Movement of Ukraine, Ternopil Oblast, No. 357 (1994–1998)[2] People's Movement of Ukraine, No. 1 (1998–1999)[3]
Personal details
Born	(1937-12-24)24 December 1937 Yerky, Ukrainian SSR, Soviet Union (now Ukraine)
Died	25 March 1999(1999-03-25) (aged 61) Ivankiv, Ukraine
Political party	People's Movement of Ukraine (from 1989)
Other political affiliations	Komsomol (c. late 1950s–1966)
Spouses	Iryna Brunevets ​ ​ (m. 1960; div. 1962)​ Olena Antoniv ​ ​ (m. 1963, divorced)​ Atena Pashko ​ (m. 1969)​
Children	2 (Andriy, Taras)
Alma mater	Taras Shevchenko University of Kyiv
Occupation	Politician Soviet dissident
Awards	Order of State Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise Shevchenko Prize (1996)
Signature

Viacheslav Maksymovych Chornovil (Ukrainian: В'ячеслав Максимович Чорновіл; 24 December 1937 – 25 March 1999) was a Ukrainian politician and Soviet dissident. As a prominent Ukrainian dissident in the Soviet Union, he was arrested multiple times in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s for his political views.^[4] From 1992 onwards, Chornovil was one of the leaders of Rukh, the People's Movement of Ukraine, which was the first opposition party in democratic Ukraine, and editor-in-chief of the newspaper Chas-Time (Chas) from 1995. One of the most prominent political figures of the 1980s and 1990s, Chornovil paved the way for contemporary Ukraine to regain its independence.

Born in Kyiv Oblast, Chornovil was originally a journalist in newspaper and television before he was fired and sentenced to forced labour due to his dissident activism. Chornovil became one of Ukraine's foremost independence activists, and was an early member of the Ukrainian Helsinki Group. In 1988, he founded the People's Movement of Ukraine, the first non-communist party in Ukraine, and ran unsuccessfully to be the first president of independent Ukraine in 1991, losing to Leonid Kravchuk.

Following the 1994 Ukrainian presidential election, Chornovil became one of President Leonid Kuchma's foremost critics. Though he was expected to face Kuchma in the 1999 Ukrainian presidential election, his sudden and mysterious death in a car accident brought an end to his campaign. Chornovil has been remembered as one of the most significant figures in Ukraine's regained independence in 1991.