The European Parliament today recognized the Holodomor, the famine in Ukraine caused by the Soviets 90 years ago that killed millions, as genocide.
The European Parliament today recognized the Holodomor, the famine in Ukraine caused by the Soviets 90 years ago that killed millions, as genocide.
In a text voted almost unanimously (507 votes in favor, 12 against and 17 abstentions), MEPs in Strasbourg state that the Holodomor (extermination by hunger in Ukrainian) was committed “by the Soviet regime with the intention of destroying a group of people deliberately causing living conditions that inevitably led to their physical extinction.”
Initial estimates of the death toll by historians and government officials varied widely. According to some estimates, as many as 12 million Ukrainians died of starvation.
As Wikipedia states, a joint United Nations declaration signed by 25 countries in 2003, speaks of 7-10 million deaths.
According to findings of the Kyiv Tribunal in 2010, demographic losses due to the famine amounted to 10 million, with 3.9 direct deaths from famine and an additional 6.1 million as a birth deficit.
Ukraine, the “breadbasket of Europe,” lost four to eight million inhabitants in the Great Famine of 1932-1933 as part of the collectivization of land, which historians say was orchestrated by Stalin to suppress any desire for that country’s independence which was then a Soviet republic.
Ukraine has been campaigning for years to have the Holodomor recognized as genocide, an idea forged during World War II.
“Current Russian crimes are a reminder of the past,” the European Parliament insisted in a statement yesterday, awarding the Zakharov Prize for Human Rights and Freedom of Thought to the Ukrainian people fighting against the Russian invasion.
MEPs call on “all countries and organizations” to also recognize this famine as genocide against a “Russian regime (which) falsifies historical memory for its own survival”.
Russia categorically denies this characterization, saying that the great famine that swept through the Soviet Union in the early 1930s caused casualties not only in Ukraine, but also in Russia, Kazakhstan, the Volga Germans and members of other peoples.
Germany, which also recognized the Holomodor as a genocide in November, has been accused by Moscow of “demonizing” Russia.
RES-EMP
Read the News today and get the latest news.
Follow Skai.gr on Google News and be the first to know all the news.
With a wealth of experience honed over 4+ years in journalism, I bring a seasoned voice to the world of news. Currently, I work as a freelance writer and editor, always seeking new opportunities to tell compelling stories in the field of world news.
