Posted by Vasko on October 12, 1999 at 21:14:22:
Such people as you call "Rusyns" (who call themselves Rusnaks, which you obviously don't know) are truly Slovaks.
I should know, I am one of them. It is only because of their Greek Catholic faith that they were torn from the national development of other Slovaks.
You will notice how Slovaks in Ukraine are organizing and publishing. Uz~horod is a historical cultural and religious capital for Slovaks which it truly fulfilled when Podkarpatsko was part of Slovakia.
In Slovakia, all respected Slovak linguists class our dialects with other east Slovakia dialects. It is former communists in Pres~ov and Medzilaborce who are trying in vain to convince people otherwise.
In my native Rusnak village in east Slovakia, with population of over 2000, total number of people of Ukrainian or Ruthenian nationality is 19. Local communist party boss and his family!!
In New York City area along there are thousands of us who come from Slovakia since 1968 who know we are Slovaks. We are neither Ruthenians nor Ukrainians. Communist Ukrainians have no claim on eastern Slovakia even though declaration of us as Ukrainians is first step in the master plan.
Come see us at our Slovak-Rusnak festival in Newark, NJ on October 24! We will be there in our native costumes and singing our national Slovak songs (in our Rusnak dialect, of course).
Maj s~a!