[6] During World War II in 1944, he was recruited in the Soviet Red Army aged 15, as he lied that he had been born in 1927[7]) and served in Austria and then in the Caucasus region (cities Ordzhonikidze and Nakhichevan).

In Austria, he observed the arrival of Ukrainian wheat in Baden bei Wien, which reminded him of the removal of grain from Ukraine when he almost starved in the 1930s during the Holodomor.

[7] That event made Lukianenko to "follow Severyn Nalyvaiko's path – I would fight for an independent Ukraine.

"[7] In 1953, Lukianenko enrolled in the Law Department of Moscow State University and joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU).

"[8] In 1959, during the Khrushchev Thaw, he organized a dissident movement in Hlyniany, the Ukrainian Workers and Peasants Union, along with Ivan Kandyba and others.

[9] In May 1961, he was expelled from the party, arrested, tried, and sentenced by the Lviv Oblast Court to death for separatism, "undermining the credibility of the CPSU, and defaming the theory of Marxism-Leninism."

[7] Lukianenko was elected a member of the Verkhovna Rada (Ukraine's parliament) in March 1990 and became the head of the new Ukrainian Republican Party the following month.

[11] Lukianenko was awarded the title Hero of Ukraine by Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko on 19 April 2005.

[15] In 2005, Lukianenko participated in a conference entitled "Zionism as the Biggest Threat to Modern Civilization," which was controversial for its antisemitic tone and his invitation of the former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke.

"[17] Lukianenko disputed the existence of antisemitism in Ukraine, claiming he had "not met a single Ukrainian who is opposed to all Semitic people.