The following written message was sent to the July 12-13 Schiller Institute conference in Berlin by Natalia Vitrenko, the leader of the unlawfully banned Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine. It was read by the moderator during the second part of Panel 1, who explained that Vitrenko was recently targeted by regime propaganda and that her life is in danger.
Dear conference participants, friends, dear Helga:
Greetings on the opening of this very important conference. I wish you success in its work. I greatly regret that I cannot take part and address the conference myself. I highly value the work of the Schiller Institute and its conferences, as unique platforms for the free exchange of opinions among people from different continents, on the pressing problems of planet Earth. The legacy of Lyndon LaRouche gives us a technology for conceptualizing the problems of the world financial system and the possibility of proposing a life-saving alternative.
I am grateful to the Schiller Institute and its leader, Helga Zepp-LaRouche, personally, for paying close attention to the tragedy of the war in Ukraine and to what has happened to me.
I would like my friends, above all, to know the truth directly from me: our Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine (PSPU) was unlawfully banned in 2022, in violation of the presumption of innocence, the rule of law, and the fundamental human rights of free speech, freedom of association, and freedom for lawful political opposition. These rights are all guaranteed under the Constitution of Ukraine and the European Convention on Human Rights.
The basis of our party’s political program was the Declaration of State Sovereignty of Ukraine, adopted by the lawful Parliament of Ukraine on 16 July 1990. The support of the people of Ukraine in two referenda, those of 17 March and 1 December 1991, gave that Declaration the highest judicial force in our country. Our people defined neutrality and a nuclear-weapons-free status as the basis of our independence. The international community recognized Ukraine as having precisely such sovereignty. It is true that our party proposed an alternative economic and social model and alternative solutions for humanitarian issues. But our party proposed to achieve those goals exclusively by peaceful means.
In the process of banning the PSPU, neither the Ministry of Justice, nor the Security Service of Ukraine, presented in court a single piece of evidence that the party had plans for a violent overthrow of the government. Thus, the PSPU was banned in gross violation of the Constitution of Ukraine and of European standards of democracy.
The European Court of Human Rights accepted the PSPU’s complaint about its ban for consideration two-and-a-half years ago, but, unfortunately, the case has not yet been heard.
Eleven parties have been banned in Ukraine—parties advocating peace.
The ban of our party under martial law and while the war is going on made it possible for the mass media, pro-government politicians, and officials to fabricate slanders against me with impunity, circulate them in the media, and instigate physical attacks on me.
I am grateful for the articles [in EIR] about how I have been slandered in Ukraine, a country I have never abandoned nor hidden from. I can confirm that the facts and analysis in these articles are true and precise. Thank you again for them!
Dear conference participants: best wishes for the work of the conference! Indeed, man should be a friend to man. Only then will our planet Earth, so divinely beautiful, survive.
Natalia Vitrenko, People’s Deputy of Ukraine, 1995-2002, Doctor of Economics, Candidate for the Presidency of Ukraine in 1999 and 2004, leader of the unlawfully banned Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine, 11 July 2025.
