Ukraine Remebers Holodomor

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky and First Lady Olena Zelenska take part in a ceremony to commemorate the victims of the famine in Ukraine on Nov. 26, 2022. President.gov.ua 

Washington Post: Ukrainians remember suffering inflicted by Stalin, Putin 90 years apart 

KYIV, Ukraine — As Ukrainians lit candles and observed a moment of silence on Saturday to remember millions of their countrymen who died in a 1930s famine, European leaders gathered in the Ukrainian capital, accusing Moscow of using “hunger as a weapon of war against Ukraine.” 

The prime ministers of Belgium, Poland and Lithuania, and the Hungarian president, met with Ukraine’s leader, Volodymyr Zelensky, for an “international summit on food security.” 

The gathering was brought about by Moscow’s continuing squeeze on Ukrainian grain exports, which has created food shortages across the globe. 

The German and French presidents and the head of the European Commission also spoke via video, news reports said. Saturday was also the day that Ukrainians remembered the victims of the “Holodomor” — or “death by hunger” — a Soviet-orchestrated famine in 1932-1933, which Ukrainians commemorate annually on the fourth Saturday in November.  

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Update #1: Ukraine remembers Stalin-era famine as Russia war rages (CNBC/Reuters)  

Update #2: 90 Years On, Ukrainians See Repeat of Soviet 'Genocide' (Moscow Times/AFP)  

WNU Editor: This is a sober day of remembrance for my family. My father and his family were in the middle of this famine, and even though my father was 11 at the time, he made sure that his memories were passed on to me. 

And what were my father's memories? 

Praising Stalin at the start of school everyday even though everyone was starving. Posters everywhere praising Stalin for feeding the nation. A neighbor begging my grandmother for her potato peels. Learning how to breed and skin rabbits for protein. As well as learning how to fish. The power of gold, and how a few ounces can save a family from certain death due to starvation. The commissars and their muscle going house to house to confiscate any food. Even using steel poles to poke the backyard in case food was buried. People lying dead and emancipated in the streets for days. Many homes accidentally catching on fire during the winter months by people desperate for heat. 

But the memory that sticks out the most for my father is that Stalin and the Communist apparatus did not discriminate. Ukrainians, Russians, Tartars, other ethnic groups, all were swept up in this man-made genocide. With the exception of the Communists and their supporters .... millions suffered and died.