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His Beatitude Constantine, Metropolitian, Ukrainian Orthodox Church, USA
His Grace Stefan, Metropolitan, Ukrainian Catholic Church in the USA
Michael Sawkiw, Jr., President. Ukrainian Congress Committee of America
Washington, D.C., July 2003
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Tragedy has afflicted the Ukrainian nation numerous times throughout the
course of its over 1,000-year history. No one period, however, can compare
to the horrific consequences of the 1932-1933 Famine-Genocide, forced upon
the Ukrainian people. The death by starvation of 7 to 10 million peasants
in Ukraine's black-earth soil was caused not by nature, but by deliberate
grain requisition policies of the Soviet Union, introduced with an eye
towards destroying resistance to collectivization as well as Ukrainian
national aspirations.
The widespread starvation was unquestionably a deliberate genocide carried
out against the Ukrainian populace by the Soviet regime. The borders of
Ukraine were sealed, both to international relief efforts and to Ukrainians
fleeing the countryside in search of food. Additionally, in the context of
other events of that time, such as the destruction of the Ukrainian
Autocephalous Orthodox Church and the liquidation of the Ukrainian
intellectual elite, one can see that the Famine-Genocide was the horrific
culmination of the genocidal policy of the Soviet Union against the
Ukrainian nation.
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By the Chumak Road of the Thirty Seventh
Poster by B. Boyko
Private Collection of ArtUkraine.com
(Click on image to enlarge it)
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Because Soviet authorities could not have done this had the world been
watching diligently, they set about hiding it from the international
community. Soviet denials of the Famine-Genocide managed to convince many
people that there was no famine. They were not alone in their efforts,
however. The Western press assisted the Soviet Union in covering up this
awful episode in history. The most infamous example of this is Pulitzer
Prize-winning New York Times correspondent Walter Duranty, who denied
reports of famine in Ukraine as "malignant propaganda" while privately
confiding that as many as ten million had starved to death.
Since regaining its independence in 1991, Ukraine has begun to freely
discuss the Famine-Genocide, and on May 15, 2003, the parliament of Ukraine
declared the events of 1932-1933 to be "a genocide against the Ukrainian
nation." This statement corresponds to the findings of the U.S. Commission
on the Ukraine Famine, which in 1988 concluded "Josef Stalin and those
around him committed genocide against Ukrainians in 1932-1933."
We applaud these declarations and consider them vital to bringing this
tragic event into the world's collective memory. That one of the most
barbarous crimes of the 20th century took place on the European continent
while very few took notice defies imagination. Should freedoms, such as
those
accorded in the United States, have been present in Ukraine during the
famine-genocide, the terror committed upon the Ukrainian nation would not
have transpired.
While this tragedy may be well known to Ukrainians in their native land and
abroad, it is still not widely recognized worldwide. We call upon the
Ukrainian American community to advocate Congress for the construction of a
Famine-Genocide memorial in Washington, DC, while appealing to the United
Nations General Assembly to recognize this tragedy as a genocide and to once
and for all put an end to the famine deniers and historical distortion that
has plagued the previous century's discourse on the subject. The global
community must be aware of what happened in Ukraine during those years so
that it is never allowed to happen again. This chapter of Ukrainian and
world history must not be forgotten.
God has blessed us in the fulfillment of our greatest dream - the
independence of our native land. In His Grace, we are bound to a sacred
responsibility, in the name of all those who perished, to make it a
certainty that their memory will serve to enhance Ukraine's continued
progress along a democratic path. Together, ecclesiastical and community
organizations must be the moral conscience of the nation - even in the most
difficult of circumstances.
May God eternally embrace the victims of the Ukrainian Famine-Genocide,
and may God bless the United States of America and Ukraine.
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