A short version of this article will appear in the October 2021 issue of the Notices of the AMS
In 2014, a revolution broke out in Ukraine in response to the actions of the criminal president Yanukovych. Russia responded by annexing Ukrainian territory and starting a war in Eastern Ukraine. All this was done at the time when lies were ginned up about both the nature of the Ukrainian Revolution of Dignity and the participation of Russian military men in the war. The world saw Russia’s actions as they were: violation of international law and attempt to prevent Ukrainians as a nation from choosing their own future.
Russia’s war in Ukraine has already claimed more than 10,000 lives and forced more than 2,000,000 people to desolate their homes. Although this war has disappeared from international news, shelling continues and the death toll is rising every week. This situation destroyed Ukrainian economy and caused enormous damage to the Ukrainian scientific community. Universities were displaced, careers were broken. Many scientific ties were severed, and cooperation was terminated. Our colleagues in Crimea are persecuted for resisting Putin’s regime.
In recent years, many of us have felt uncomfortable declining invitations to science events in Russia. What do the organizers have to do with the war? Probably, nothing. However, like millions of people from our home country, we simply cannot set foot on Russian soil since 2014.
Imagine the shock of Ukrainian mathematicians in 2018 when the IMU honored Russia to host the ICM. The Russian Government has invested heavily to win the tender against France. The fact is that important international events such as ICMs legitimize regimes with blood on their hands. They gloat over the fact that although we judge them morally, we do not hesitate to take their money. Arkadiy Dvorkovich, a senior Russian government official, was personally involved in the fight to attract ICM to Russia. The ICM Executive Organizing Committee is chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Dmitriy Chernyshenko. Official organizers include Dmitriy Derevianshkin, a high-ranking FSB (former KGB) officer, and Aleksei Zinin, Major General of the National Guard. With all this in mind, on February 26, 2021, the IMU Executive Committee issued a statement declaring its complete indifference to any moral considerations in decision-making: “The IMU, as well as the International Scientific Council, of which the IMU is a member, oppose all boycotts of scientific events and all attempts to link scientific activity with political and social problems, since the boycott is considered to be harmful to everyone concerned.” Many of us live in the society that is advanced enough to care about things like the coffee fair trade, or worry about whether the products we use are made using child labor. So why should the IMU, which is supposed to represent us, remain so morally neutral? Accounting for human rights cannot be called “politics” and rejected. We know that there are conflicts in the world that have polarized our community. Does it mean that we should not make moral judgments when it is obvious? Russia annexed part of the independent European country, which has not happened since the first half of the last century. Why is this ambiguous? Why not take care of many other human rights abuses that Russia is committing, such as suppression of freedom of speech, political assassinations, persecution of the LGBT community? Does the IMU want us to be detached theorem-producing machines? So that we don’t pay attention to such violations?
Historically, the IMU has often taken political events into account. In April 1982, the IMU Executive Committee decided to abolish the ICM in Warsaw due to the imposition of martial law and the brutal suppression of the Solidarity Movement. Today’s IMU likes to pretend that Congress is only concerned with mathematics, but since about 2002, it has been quite ready to provide PR opportunities to the political leaders of the host countries. Many of these leaders have later faced serious corruption charges, and some are serving time in prison. But never until 2022 did the IMU shake hands with fresh blood, so willingly. If Putin wanted to personally award the Fields Medals, would the IMU have the courage to say no? We don’t think so.
What about Russia’s mathematicians? We value and respect our colleagues from Russia. Some of them have shown courage in resisting the Putin’s regime. However, it is not a basic human right to host an ICM in your country. Don’t be killed by Russian mortars.
As we write this, we feel like David confronting Goliath. We do not have the resources of an oil-rich country to distribute. We stand up for what we think is right. The moral indifference of the IMU must terminate, and we invite those who agree with us to join the ICM 2022 boycott.
Signed by:
Taras Banakh, Professor, Ivan Franko National University of Lviv, Ukraine,
Oksana Bezushchak, Professor, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Ukraine,
Roman Cherniha, Doctor of Science, Professor, Institute of Mathematics of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, and 30 mathematicians from Ukraine, Great Britain, Poland, USA, Germany, France, Australia, Sweden.