The Ukrainian National Party (, Ukrainska Natsionalna Partiia, UNP; , PNU) was a right-wing agrarian group, representing the Ukrainian minority in Romania. Its founder and president was the scholar Volodymyr Zalozetsky-Sas, who supported the "classocratic" Hetmanism of Pavlo Skoropadskyi and Vyacheslav Lypynsky; the PNU leadership also included Vasyl Dutchak, Teodor Ivanytsky, and Lev Kohut, who stood for more moderate currents of Ukrainian nationalism. Always strongest among the Ukrainians of Bukovina, the party was united in its opposition to Romanianization, but overall accepted Romanian rule. Its more radical faction, supportive of "Greater Ukraine", gravitated toward the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists after 1933; the mainstream did not.

The UNP emerged after a seven-year hiatus, during which many Ukrainians boycotted Romanian politics, concentrated on cultural campaigns, or took up repressed causes such as socialism. Returning from self-imposed exile, Zalozetsky-Sas took over for Dutchak and his Ukrainian Social Democratic Party, synchronizing with the Ukrainian nationalist groups in Poland and Czechoslovakia. The attempts to spread the movement into Bessarabia and Maramureș were disavowed by the Romanian authorities.

Founded in 1926, the UNP registered its first electoral gains in 1928, an ally of the National Peasants' Party. Its team contested all the elections of the following nine years, often against other Ukrainians or Rusyns, and almost always in alliance with mainstream parties. Around 1933, its anti-communism made it prone to infiltration by Nazi agents. Its final appearance was during the 1937 race, when it won its last seat in Parliament in cartel with the National Liberal Party. Like all other Romanian parties, the UNP was banned, in early 1938, by the National Renaissance Front. Zalozetsky-Sas and other former UNP leaders served as Ukrainian representatives within the Front before the Soviet occupation of 1940.

History Background By the end of World War I, Austria-Hungary's Duchy of Bukovina had come to be disputed between the Kingdom of Romania and the West Ukrainian People's Republic (ZUNR). Most of the Bukovinian Ukrainians, centered in the northern half, supported incorporation with a Ukrainian state; the Romanians, who were concentrated in the south, formed a General Congress of Bukovina, which obtained the region's de facto incorporation into Greater Romania. As a result, the Ukrainian elites opted to boycott the Congress—Zalozetsky-Sas, Hierotheus Pihuliak, and Stepan Smal-Stotskyi left Bukovina in protest, confident that the Paris Peace Conference would sort matters in their favor.Mihai, pp. 79–80, 82–83, 86 Father Kassian Bogatyrets, who stood for the prewar Russophile movement, remained in Romanian-held territory and represented the Ukrainian community at negotiations with the new administration.Hrenciuc, pp. 160–161

To 1919, Zalozetsky-Sas served the ZUNR's foreign diplomacy as an envoy to German-Austria and Switzerland.Agstner, p. 177 After the ZUNR's disestablishment, he also became a celebrated art historian, researching the impact of Gothic and Baroque architecture in Western Ukraine.Maryana Levytska, "Реставраційна практика Макса Дворжака: львівські епізоди", in Studiyi Mystetstvoznavchi, Issue 4 (36), pp. 107, 112, 113 Politically, he and his mentor Vyacheslav Lypynsky supported the revival of a monarchical Ukrainian Hetmanate, and were ideologically opposed to the left-leaning People's Republic (UNR) and Symon Petliura. Their "classocratic" program fused agrarianism, producerism and corporatism, criticizing party democracy, and upholding Skoropadskyi as the guarantee of Ukrainian unity.Roman Senkus, Ukrainian Union of Agrarians-Statists, Encyclopedia of Ukraine entry In Vienna, Zalozetsky-Sas joined Lypynsky's Ukrainian Agrarian Statist Party (USKhD), which, in 1921, also organized a chapter in Romania—the Union of Ukrainian Agrarians, presided upon by P. Novitsky in Bucharest.

In Bukovina, the Romanian nationalist Ion Nistor and his Democratic Union Party seized the opportunity and ran pro-Romanian Ukrainians and Poles as candidates for the 1919 elections.Mihai, pp. 83–84, 86, 102 Active on the left side of the spectrum, Constantin Krakalia joined the Socialist Party. In early 1920, he spent time in prison for protesting against the People's Party (PP) government's clampdown on Ukrainian socialism.Hrenciuc, pp. 169–170 He ran in the elections of May against Bogatyrets,Mihai, pp. 84–85 taking a seat in the Assembly of Deputies, where he demanded a plebiscite over the territorial status of Bukovina and Maramureș.Hrenciuc, p. 170 The election of November 1922 were held under the watch of National Liberal Party (PNL), which supported centralizing policies. During the race, the incumbent Rusyn Senator Jevhen Kozak was arrested and intimidated.Mihai, pp. 86–87 Fearing persecution, Krakalia made his way into the opposition Peasants' Party; the other Ukrainian socialists soon came into contact with the Union for the Liberation of Ukraine, and were either arrested or pushed to leave Romania.

Another group, the Ukrainian National Organization, was founded in Cernăuți (Chernivtsi) by lawyers Vasyl Dutchak and Lev Kohut. Kohut edited its weekly Ridnyi Krai,Kohut, Lev, Encyclopedia of Ukraine entryRidnyi krai (Chernivtsi), Encyclopedia of Ukraine entry while Dutchak inaugurated the Ukrainian protests against Romanianization, addressing four reports on the matter to the League of Nations.Dutchak, Vasyl, Encyclopedia of Ukraine entry Some referred to the reforms of Constantin Angelescu, the Education Minister, which had made it a requirement for Ukrainian teachers to learn Romanian language and history, while also dissolving the community schools.Bran, pp. 254–256; Fritz, pp. 14–17. See also Hrenciuc, pp. 163–172

Establishment In 1922, Dutchak founded his own Ukrainian Social Democratic Party, where he mainly focused on language rights and strategies for the promotion of Ukrainian in legal contexts.Bran, p. 256; Hrenciuc, pp. 170–171 At the time, he accused the Romanian establishment of aiming to "effect the destruction of the Ukrainian people in Bukovina". This moderate-critical wing later reemerged and the Ukrainian People's Party and Ukrainian Democratic People's Party, focused on moderate projects of cultural improvement, and being supported by Ridnyi Krai. Their leadership included Dutchak, Kohut, and Antin Lukasevych.Mihai, p. 89 Lukasevych and Iurii Lysan both took seats in Parliament in the election of summer 1926, after having caucused with the PP.Hrenciuc, p. 171; Mihai, p. 86

Also in 1926, Zalozetsky-Sas made his return to Romania and established the UNP, with support from the Ukrainian National Democratic Alliance in neighboring Poland.Bran, pp. 251–252, 257; Hrenciuc, p. 171 It soon after registered as its electoral logo "two circles bordering each other, each split by a vertical diameter".Sorin Radu, "Semnele electorale ale partidelor politice în perioada interbelică", in Anuarul Apulum, Vol. XXXIX, 2002, p. 578. For a visual representation, see "Haosul electoral", in Realitatea Ilustrată, Nr. 285, July 1935, p. 28 Zalozetsky-Sas was its president, with Yurii Serbyniuk as his second, and with Dutchak, Kohut and Lysan as prominent party organizers. Other major figures of the UNP include Teodor Ivanytsky, Orest Shkraba, and Denis Mayer-Mykhalsky.Arkadii Zhukovsky, Ukrainian National party, Encyclopedia of Ukraine entry Another member, Anton Kyrylov, was the manager of its funds, and came up with a scheme whereby all Ukrainians would contribute 10% of their income to the UNP.Bran, p. 252 The party's innovative institutions also included a "High National Court", which passed informal judgments on all contentious issues between Ukrainians.

Its activity centered on Cernăuți, the UNP united more factions than the pro-Hetmanate "classocrats". It was also an ideological successor of Ivan Franko's National Democratic Party (to which Ivanytsky had belonged),Ivanytsky, Teodor, Encyclopedia of Ukraine entry and preserved a distinctly liberal wing, under Dutchak.Chas, Encyclopedia of Ukraine entry Overall, the party supported national development inside Romania, including the establishment of co-operatives, credit unions and banks,Bran, p. 256; Hrenciuc, p. 171 and endorsed land reform; more particularly, it carried the protest against Romanianization, demanding the introduction of Ukrainian-language literature in schools and in Bukovina Orthodox churches. Zalozetsky-Sas was a participant in the International Congress of National Minorities, where he issued reports on the fate of Ukrainians in Romania, but also in Poland and the Soviet Union.

The Romanian writer Dragoș Vitencu reacted against the UNP's claims, arguing that Zalozetsky-Sas actually supported revisionism in favor of a "chimera" project, that of "Greater Ukraine".Vitencu, pp. 42–43, 51–54, 56–78 Such ideas were formally shunned by the UNP leadership, which only asked for a level of decentralization, and also by the UNR, which recognized Bukovina as part of Romania.Bran, pp. 253, 256–259 However, Zalozetsky-Sas made statements advocating the preservation of "strong links" with the Ukrainians of Carpathian Ruthenia and Eastern Galicia.Hrenciuc, pp. 171–172 The explicitly irredentist line was preserved by the UNP youth organization, or Susor (affiliated with the Central Union of Ukrainian Students). Susor members staged nationalist propaganda campaigns in the countryside, often in an illegal association with the Plast scouts.Bran, pp. 253, 257–258

The UNP could count on some 32,000 voters in Bukovina. Its attempts to organize outside the region, among the Ukrainians of Maramureș or Bessarabia, were sabotaged by government, and registered few results. From October 1928, its main tribune was Chas, the only Bukovinian Ukrainian daily. Put out by a staff which included Ivanytsky, Volodymyr Kmitsykevych, Teofil Bryndzan, and Kohut, it merged with Ridnyi Krai in 1930. According to Vitencu, this was an especially dangerous enterprise, which served to "infect the villages" with Ukrainian nationalist ideas.Vitencu, pp. 56–58 The women's interest pages were edited by Olha Huzar, leader of the women's hromada.Huzar, Olha, Encyclopedia of Ukraine entry Two other periodicals, Narod and Narodnia Syla, were also informally affiliated with the UNP.

PNȚ alliance

In view of the December 1928 election, the UNP sought to form an alliance with the most Ukrainian-friendly party in the race. This produced, on November 11, an alliance with the opposition National Peasants' Party (PNȚ), which by then had a separate Ukrainian chapter, presided upon by Krakalia.Mihai, pp. 89, 92–93, 99 Zalozetsky-Sas ran as a non-member affiliate of the PNȚ (the only UNP man accepted by the latter), winning the Senate seat for Storojineț County.Mihai, pp. 92–93, 99 From November 18, he had been reconfirmed as party leader by a 500-strong UNP First Congress. The Executive Committee also included Kohut, Serbyniuk, and Kyrylov.Mihai, p. 92 In 1930, during the partial elections for an Assembly seat in Storojineț County, the UNP was able to present a candidate of its own, Dutchak, who won. The following year, it managed the same feat in Cernăuți County, electing Shkraba to a seat previously held by Iacob Pistiner.Mihai, p. 101 Before March 1931, the UNP drifted apart from its PNȚ backers, and set up a parliamentary "minorities bloc", also including the German Party and the Magyar Party."Buletinul Camerei. Legea contra cametei", in Adevărul, March 6, 1931, p. 3