Holodomor

The Holodomor ( _uk. Голодомор) is the famine that took place in Soviet Ukraine during the 1932-1933 agricultural season when the devastating famines also took place in several other regions of the USSR. The Holodomor ravaged the rural population of the Ukrainian SSR, and is considered one of the greatest national catastrophes to affect the Ukrainian nation in modern history. [http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-275913/Ukraine#404577.hook|Ukraine - The famine of 1932–33] - Encyclopædia Britannica: "The Great Famine (Holodomor) of 1932–33—a man-made demographic catastrophe unprecedented in peacetime. Of the estimated six to eight million people who died in the Soviet Union, about four to five million were Ukrainians."] [Helen Fawkes, [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6179818.stm "Legacy of famine divides Ukraine"] , "BBC News", November 24, 2006] Estimates for the total number of casualties within Soviet Ukraine range between 2.2 million (demographers' estimate) [ France Meslé, Gilles Pison, Jacques Vallin [http://www.ined.fr/en/resources_documentation/publications/pop_soc/bdd/publication/47/ France-Ukraine: Demographic Twins Separated by History] , "Population and societies", N°413, juin 2005] [ ce Meslé, Jacques Vallin Mortalité et causes de décès en Ukraine au XXè siècle + CDRom ISBN 2-7332-0152-2 CD online data (partially - http://www.ined.fr/fichier/t_publication/cdrom_mortukraine/cdrom.htm ] and 3-3.5 million (historians' estimate),Stanislav Kulchytsky, Hennadiy Yefimenko. [http://web.archive.org/web/20070708024619/http://www.history.org.ua/kul/contents.htm Демографічні наслідки голодомору 1933 р. в Україні. Всесоюзний перепис 1937 р. в Україні: документи та матеріали] (Demographic consequence of Holodomor of 1933 in Ukraine. The all-Union census of 1937 in Ukraine), Kiev, Institute of History, 2003. pp. 42-63] С. Уиткрофт (Stephen G. Wheatcroft), [http://lj.streamclub.ru/history/tragedy.html#add2 "О демографических свидетельствах трагедии советской деревни в 1931—1933 гг."] (On demographic evidence of the tragedy of the Soviet village in 1931-1833), "Трагедия советской деревни: Коллективизация и раскулачивание 1927-1939 гг.: Документы и материалы. Том 3. Конец 1930-1933 гг.", Российская политическая энциклопедия, 2001, ISBN 5-8243-0225-1, с. 885, Приложение № 2] though much higher figures are often quoted by the media and cited in political debates.Peter Finn, [http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/26/AR2008042602039.html?sub=new Aftermath of a Soviet Famine] , "The Washington Post", April 27, 2008, "There are no exact figures on how many died. Modern historians place the number between 2.5 million and 3.5 million. Yushchenko and others have said at least 10 million were killed." ]

The reasons of the famine are the subject of intense scholarly and political debate. Some historians claim the famine was purposely engineered by the Soviet authorities as an attack on Ukrainian nationalism, while others view it as an unintended consequence of the economic problems associated with radical economic changes implemented during the period of Soviet industrialization. [http://web.archive.org/web/20030429084514/http://www.unimelb.edu.au/ExtRels/Media/UN/archive/1998/319/stalinismwasacollective.html 'Stalinism' was a collective responsibility - Kremlin papers] , "The News in Brief", University of Melbourne, 19 June 1998, Vol 7 No 22] It is sometimes argued that natural causes may have been the primary reason for the disaster.

There is no international consensus among scholars or politicians on whether the Soviet policies that caused the famine fall under the legal definition of genocide cite journal | author=Yaroslav Bilinsky| title= Was the Ukrainian Famine of 1932–1933 Genocide?| journal= Journal of Genocide Research | year= 1999| volume= 1| issue= 2| pages= 147–156 | url=http://www.faminegenocide.com/resources/bilinsky.html | doi=10.1080/14623529908413948 ] [http://www.uofaweb.ualberta.ca/historyandclassics/davidmarples.cfm Dr. David Marples] , [http://www.expressnews.ualberta.ca/article.cfm?id=7176 The great famine debate goes on...] , "ExpressNews" (University of Alberta), originally published in "Edmonton Journal", November 30, 2005] Stanislav Kulchytsky, "Holodomor of 1932–1933 as genocide: the gaps in the proof", "Den", February 17, 2007, [http://www.day.kiev.ua/177442/ in Russian] , [http://www.day.kiev.ua/177403/ in Ukrainian] ] Stanislav Kulchytsky, "Holodomor-33: Why and how?", "Zerkalo Nedeli", November 25—December 1, 2006, [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/ie/show/624/55147/ in Russian] , [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/624/55147/ in Ukrainian] .] ; however, as of March 2008, the parliament of Ukraine and the governments of several other countries have recognized the actions causing Holodomor as an act of genocide.Sources differ on interpreting various statements from different branches of different governments as to whether they amount to the official recognition of the Famine as Genocide by the country. For example, after the statement issued by the Latvian Sejm on March 13, 2008, the total number of countries is given as 19 (according to "Ukrainian BBC": [http://www.bbc.co.uk/ukrainian/domestic/story/2008/03/080313_latvia_holodomor_oh.shtml "Латвія визнала Голодомор ґеноцидом"] ), 16 (according to "Korrespondent", Russian edition: [http://korrespondent.net/ukraine/politics/403002 "После продолжительных дебатов Сейм Латвии признал Голодомор геноцидом украинцев"] ), "more than 10" (according to "Korrespondent", Ukrainian edition: [http://ua.korrespondent.net/ukraine/403780 "Латвія визнала Голодомор 1932-33 рр. геноцидом українців"] )]

Etymology

The origins of the word Holodomor come from the Ukrainian words "holod", ‘hunger’, and "mor", ‘plague’,Ukrainian "holod" (голод, ‘hunger’, compare Russian "golod") should not be confused with "kholod" (холод, ‘cold’). For details, see romanization of Ukrainian. "Mor" means ‘plague’ in the sense of a disastrous evil or affliction, or a sudden unwelcome outbreak. See .] possibly from the expression "moryty holodom", ‘to inflict death by hunger’. The Ukrainian verb "moryty" (морити) means "to poison somebody, drive to exhaustion or to torment somebody". The perfect form of the verb "moryty" is "zamoryty"mdash"kill or drive to death by hunger, exhausting work". The neologism “Holodomor” is given in the modern, two-volume dictionary of the Ukrainian language as "artificial hunger, organised in vast scale by the criminal regime against the country's population" [ [http://slovnyk.net/?swrd=%E3%EE%EB%EE%E4%EE%EC%EE%F0 Голодомор] , in "Velykyi tlumachnyi slovnyk suchasnoi ukrainsʹkoi movy: 170 000 sliv", chief ed. V. T. Busel, Irpin, Perun (2004), ISBN 9665690132] Sometimes the expression is translated into English as "murder by hunger." [Helen Fawkes , [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6179818.stm Legacy of famine divides Ukraine] , "BBC News", 24 November 2006]

cope and duration

Historians working with declassified Ukrainian SSR documents have concluded that mass starvation in the Ukrainian SSR lasted from the beginning of January 1933 until mid-June or the beginning of July 1933. The famine affected all 7 oblasts of the Ukrainian SSR as well as the Moldavian ASSR, a part of Ukraine at the time. However, not every "raion" (district) suffered from famine for the whole 6 month period; starvation peaked in spring 1933. The first reports of mass malnutrition and deaths from starvation emerged from 2 rayons and urban area of Uman - by the time Vinnytsya and Kiev oblasts – now Cherkasy and Kiev Oblast, dated by beginning of January 1933. By mid-January 1933 there were reports about mass “difficulties” with food in urban areas that had been undersupplied through the rationing system and deaths from starvation among people who were withdrawn from rationing supply according to Central Committee of the CP(b) of Ukraine Decree December 1932. By the beginning of February 1933, according to received reports from local authorities and Ukrainian GPU, the most affected area was listed as Dnipropetrovsk Oblast which also suffered from epidemics of typhus and malaria. Odessa and Kiev oblasts were 2nd and 3rd respectively. By mid-March most reports originated from Kiev Oblast. By mid-April 1933 the Kharkiv Oblast reached the top of the most affected list, while Kiev, Dnipropetrovsk, Odessa, Vinnytsya, Donetsk oblasts and Moldavian SSR followed it. Last reports about mass deaths from starvation dated mid-May through the beginning of June 1933 originated from Kiev and Kharkiv oblasts rayons. The “less affected” list noted the Chernihiv Oblast and northern parts of Kiev and Vinnytsya oblasts . According to the Central Committee of the CP(b) of Ukraine Decree as of February 8 1933 all hunger cases should not have been remain untreated, all local authorities directly obliged to submit reports about number of suffered from hunger, reasons of hunger, number of deaths from hunger and about food aid provided from local sources and centrally provided food aid required. Alternative reporting and food assistance were managed per GPU of Ukrainian SSR. Many regional reports and most of central summary reports are available at central and regional Ukrainian archives at present time. [Голод 1932-1933 років на Україні: очима істориків, мовою документів. [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/Publicat/Fam-kolekt-1933.php] ]

Causes and outcomes

While a complex task, it is possible to group some of the causes that contributed to the Holodomor. They have to be understood in the larger context of the social revolution 'from above' that took place in the Soviet Union at the time.С. Кульчицький, Проблема колективізації сільського господарства в сталінській “революції зверху”, ( [http://www.history.org.ua/Zbirnyk/12/2.pdf pdf] ) "Проблеми Історіїї України факти, судження, пошуки",№12, 2004, сс. 21-69]

Policy of collectivization

Approaches to changing from individual farming to a collective type of agricultural production had existed since 1917, but for various reasons (lack of agricultural equipment, agronomy resources, etc.) were not implemented widely until 1925, when there was a more intensive effort by the agricultural sector to increase the number of agricultural cooperatives and bolster the effectiveness of already existing sovkhozes. In late 1927, after the XV Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, then known as the All-Union Communist party (bolsheviks) or VKP(b), a significant impetus was given to the collectivization effort.

In 1927, a drought shortened the harvest in southern areas of the Ukrainian SSR and North Caucasus. In 1927–28 the winter tillage area was badly affected due to low snow levels. Despite seed aid from the State, many affected areas were not re-sown. The 1928 harvest was affected by drought in most of the grain producing areas of the Ukrainian SSR. Shortages in the harvest and difficulties with the supply system invoked difficulties with the food supply in urban areas and destabilized the food supply situation in the USSR in general. In order to alleviate the situation, a system of food rationing was implemented in the second quarter of 1928 initially in Odessa, and later spread to Mariupol, Kherson, Kiev, Dniprelstan (Dnipropetrovsk), and Kharkiv. At the beginning of 1929 a similar system was implemented throughout the USSR. Despite the aid from the Soviet Ukrainian and the Central governments, many southern rural areas registered occurrences of malnutrition and in some cases hunger and starvation (the affected areas and thus the amount of required food aid was under-accounted by authorities). Due to the shortage of forage livestock, its numbers were also affected .Most of Kolkhozes and recently refurnished sovkhozes went through these years with few losses, and some were even able to provide assistance to peasants in the more affected areas (seed and grain for food).

Despite the intense state campaign, the collectivization, which was initially voluntary, was not popular amongst peasants: as of early 1929, only 5.6% of Ukrainian peasant households and 3.8% of arable land was “collectivized”. In the early of 1929, the methods employed by the specially empowered authority “UkrKolhozcenter” changed from a voluntary enrollment to an administrative one. By October 1, 1929, a plan for the creation of kolkhozes was “outperformed” by 239%. As a result, 8.8% of arable land was “collectivized”. [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/Publicat/Fam-kolekt-1929.php]

The next major step toward "all-over collectivization" took place after an article was published by Stalin in Pravda, in early November 1929.

While “summoned “ by November 10, 1929 – November 17, 1929 meeting of VKP(b) Central Committee “Twenty-Five Thousanders" only trained at special short courses, the main driving force of collectivization and "dekulakization" in Ukraine became a "poor peasants committee" (“komnezamy”) and local village councils ("silrady") where komnezams members had a voting majority.

The USSR Kolhozcenter issued the December 10, 1929, decree on collectivisation of livestock within a 3-month period (draft animals 100%, cattle 100%, pigs 80%, sheep and goats 60%). This drove many peasants to slaughter their livestock. By January 1, 1930, the percentage of collectivized households almost doubled, to 16.4% of the total number of households.

Despite the infamous January 5, 1930 decree, in which the deadline for the complete collectivization of the Ukrainian SSR was set for the period from the end of 1931 to the spring of 1932, the authorities decided to accelerate the completion of the campaign by autumn of 1930. The high expectations of the plan were outperformed by local authorities even without the assistance of the 7500 “Twenty-Five Thousanders [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/Publicat/Fam-kolekt-1930.php] – and by March 70.9% of arable land and 62.8% of peasant households were suddenly collectivized. The “Dekulakization” plan was also “over-performed”. First stage of delukakization lasted from second half of January till beginning of March 1930. Such measures were applied to 309 out of 581 total districts of Ukrainian SSR were accounted 2524 thousands peasants households (out of 5054 thousands total). As of 10 of March 1930 61897 of peasants households were “dekulakized” – or 2.5% of total. While at 1929 percentage of “kulak –households” registered as 1.4%.Н. Бем, Ставлення україньского селянства до ликвидації куркульства як класу та суцільної колективізації сільського господарства (1930-1931 рр.) ( [http://www.history.org.ua/zbirnyk/9/9.pdf pdf] ), "Проблеми Історіїї України факти, судження, пошуки", [http://www.history.org.ua/zbirnyk/9/ №9] , 2003, сс. 227-243, see p. 230-231] Some of the peasants and "weak elements" were arrested and deported “to the north”. Many arrested 'kulaks' and "well-to-do" farmers resettled their families to the Urals and Central Asia. [Wheatcroft and Davies ] The term 'kulak' was ultimately applied to anybody resisting collectivization as many of the so-called 'kulaks' were no more well-off than other peasants.

The fast-track to collectivization incited numerous peasant revolts in Ukraine and in other parts of the USSR. In response to the situation "Pravda" published the Stalin's article "Dizzy with successes". Soon, numerous orders and decrees were issued banning the use of force and administrative methods. Some of those “mistakenly” dekulakized, received their property back, and some returned home. As a result the collectivization process was rolled back and by 1 May 1933 38.2% of Ukrainian SSR peasant households and 41.1% of arable land had been collectivized. By the end of August these numbers declined to 29.2% and 35.6% respectively.

A second "forced-voluntary" collectivization campaign was initiated in the winter–summer of 1931 with significant assistance of the so-called "tug-brigades" composed from kolkhoz udarniks. Many "kulaks" along with families were deported from the Ukrainian SSR.

According to declassified data, around 300,000 peasants in Ukrainian SSR were affected by these policies in 1930–31. Ukrainians composed 15% of the total 1.8 million 'kulaks' relocated Soviet-wide.Davies and Wheatcroft, p.490] Since summer 1931 all further deportations were recommended to be administered only to individuals.” Ivnitskyy "Tragedy of Soviet Village"]

This second "forced-voluntary" collectivization campaign also invoked a delay in sowing. During winter and spring of 1930–31, the Ukrainian agricultural authority "Narkomzem" issued several reports about the significant decline of livestock caused by poor treatment, absence of forage, stables/farms and due to "kulak sabotage".

According to the First Five-Year Plan, Ukrainian agriculture was to switch from an exclusive orientation of grain to a more diverse output. This included not only a rise in Sugar beet crops, but also other types of agricultural production were expected to be utilised by industry (with even cotton plants being established in 1931). This plan anticipated a decrease in grain acreage, in contrast to an increase of yield, area and of acreage for other crops.

By July 1, 1931, 65.7% of Ukrainian SSR peasant households and 67.2% of arable land were reported as "collectivized", however the main grain and sugar beet production areas were collectivized to a greater extent — 80-90%. [ [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/Publicat/Fam-kolekt-1931.php Колективізація і голод на Україні: 1929-1933. Збірник матеріалів і документів. 1931] ]

Decree of Central Committee of VKP(b) from August 2 1931 clarified the “all-over collectivization” term - in order to be considered complete the “all-over collectivization” does not have to reach “100%”, but not less then 68-70% of peasants households and not less then 75-80% of arable lands. According to the same decree “all-over collectivization” accomplished at Northern Caucasus (Kuban) - 88% of households and 92% of arable lands “collectivized”, Ukraine (South) – 85 and 94 percents respectively, Ukraine (Right Bank) – 69 and 80 percents respectively, and Moldavian ASRR (part of Ukrainian SRR) – 68 and 75 percent. Compendium of Soviet Law for 1931. Moscow, 1932]

As of the beginning of October 1931, the collectivization of 68.0% of peasant households, and 72.0% of arable land was complete.С.В. Кульчицький, Опір селянства суцільній колективізації ( [http://www.history.org.ua/Journal/2004/2/3.pdf pdf] ), "Ukrainian Historical Journal", 2004, [http://history.org.ua/0/?l=spdf&pdfn=2&pdfy=2004&pdft=jornal № 2] , 31-50.]

=Peasants action and inaction = Among other factors which contributed to the situation in spring 1933 mentioned an argument that the peasants “incentive to work disappeared” when they worked at “large collective farms.” [http://www.artukraine.com/famineart/jones4.htm] Soviet archival data for 1930-32 also support that conclusion.

This is one of the factors for reducing the sowing area in 1932 and significant losses during harvesting. Mark B. Tauger, Natural Disaster and Human Actions in the Soviet Famine of 1931-33,"The Carl Beck Papers in Russian & East European Studies", # 1506, 2001, ISSN|0889-275X, ( [http://www.as.wvu.edu/history/Faculty/Tauger/Tauger,%20Natural%20Disaster%20and%20Human%20Actions.pdf PDF] )]

By December 1932 0.725 millions of hectares of grain at most affected by famine at spring 1933 areas of Ukrainian SRR remains uncollected [ Голод 1932-1933 років на Україні: очима істориків, мовою документів. [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/Publicat/Fam-kolekt-1932.php] Document number № 118 ]

A second significant factor was “the massacre of cattle by peasants not wishing to sacrifice their property for nothing to the collective farm. [ [http://www.artukraine.com/famineart/jones4.htm The Great Famine-Genocide in Soviet Ukraine (Holodomor) ] ]

During winter and spring of 1930–31, the Ukrainian agricultural authority "Narkomzem" Ukrainian SRR issued several reports about the significant decline of livestock and especially drought power caused by poor treatment, absence of forage, stables/farms and due the "kulaks sabotage".

In the whole of 1932, only 679,000 tractor horsepower was supplied to agriculture, considerably less than in 1931. Only about half became available in time for the harvest, and even less in time for the spring sowing. Animal draught power deteriorated in quality. Horses were fed and maintained even more inadequately than in the previous year. The acute shortage of horses led to the notorious decision to employ cows as working animals. According to the speech of one Soviet official at one of the most affected by famine region, the Dnipropetrovsk Oblast "in 1932 we employ only 9000 cows, but in 1933 we involve at least 3/4 of their total number; 57000 employed at sowing." [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/Publicat/Fam-Silgosp.php] February 23, the Lower Volga party bureau decided to use 200,000 cows for special field work.

Death toll

By the end of 1933, millions of people had starved to death or had otherwise died unnaturally in Ukraine, as well as in other Soviet republics. The total estimate of the famine victims Soviet-wide is given as 6-7 million or 6-8 million. The Soviet Union long denied that the famine had ever existed, and the NKVD (and later KGB) archives on the Holodomor period opened very slowly. The exact number of the victims remains unknown and probably impossible to find out even within a margin of error of a hundred thousand.Valeriy Soldatenko, "A starved 1933: subjective thoughts on objective processes", Zerkalo Nedeli, June 28, 2003 – July 4, 2003. Available online [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/ie/show/449/38943/ in Russian] and [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/449/38943/ in Ukrainian] ]

The estimates for the number of deaths due to famine in Ukraine (excluding other repressions) vary by several millions and numbers as high as seven to ten million is sometimes given in the media [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6179818.stm BBC report] ] Laura Sheeter, [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7111296.stm "Ukraine remembers famine horror"] , "BBC News", November 24, 2007] [The Ukrainian politician Stepan Khmara during the hearings in the Verkhovna Rada (quoted through Kulchytsky): "I would like to address the scientists, particularly, Stanislav Kulchytsky, who attempts to mark down the number of victims and counts them as 3–3.5 million. I studied these questions analyzing the demographic statistics as early as in 1970s and concluded that the number of victims was no less than 7 million"
Cited through Stalislav Kulchytsky, "Reasons of the 1933 famine in Ukraine. Through the pages of one almost forgotten book" Zerkalo Nedeli, August 16-22, 2003. Available online [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/nn/show/456/41284/ in Russian] and [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/456/41284/ in Ukrainian] . However, Stanislav Kulchytsky in [http://www.history.org.ua/kul/contents.htm Демографічні наслідки голодомору 1933 р. в Україні.] (Demographic consequence of Holodomor of 1933 in Ukraine), Kiev, Institute of History, 2003, p. 4, notes that the demographic data were opened only in late 1980-s, Stepan Khmara had no access to such data in 1970s.] and a number as high as 10Viktor Yushchenko, [http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/8296.html "Holodomor"] , "The Wall Street Journal", 27.11.2007] or even twenty million is sometimes cited in political speeches. [http://web.archive.org/web/20061006021607/http://www.president.gov.ua/en/news/data/print/173.html Ukrainian President Yushchenko: Yushchenko's Address before Joint Session of U.S. Congress] ]

Estimates vary since some are based on Ukrainians who died within the 1933 borders of Ukraine; while others are based on deaths within current borders of Ukraine. Other estimates are based on deaths of Ukrainians in the Soviet Union. Some estimates use a very simple methodology based percentage of deaths that was reported in one area and applying the percentage to the entire country. Others use more sophisticated techniques involves analyzing the demographic statistics based on various censuses. Many question the accuracy of Soviet censuses since the may have been doctored to support Soviet propaganda. Other estimates come from recorded discussion between world leaders like Churchill and Stalin however the estimate of ten million deaths, which is attributed to have been circulated from within Soviet official sources could be based on a misinterpretation of the memoirs of Winston Churchill who gave an account of his conversation with Stalin that took place on August 16, 1942. In that conversation,Valentin Berezhkov, "Kak ya stal perevodchikom Stalina", Moscow, DEM, 1993, ISBN 5-85207-044-0. p. 317] Stalin gave Churchill his estimates of the number of "kulaks" who were repressed for resisting collectivization as 10 million, in all of the Soviet Union, rather than only in Ukraine. When using this number, Stalin implied that it included not only those who lost their lives, but also forcibly deported.

Some estimates count death toll from the political repression including those who died in the Gulag while others refer only to those who starved to death. Many of the estimates are based on different time periods. So to come up with a definitive answer is impossible but what all the estimates have in common is the death toll was large. Millions died.

Even the results based on scientific methods obtained prior to the opening of former Soviet archives also varied widely but the range was somewhat more narrow: 2.5 million (Volodymyr Kubiyovych), 4.8 million (Vasyl Hryshko) and 5 million (Robert Conquest).

In addition to the direct losses from unnatural deaths, the indirect losses due to the decrease of the birth rate should be taken into account in consideration in estimating of the "demographic consequences" of the Famine for Ukraine. For instance, the natural population growth in 1927 was 662,000, while in 1933 it was 97,000, in 1934 it was 88,000. The combination of direct and indirect losses from Holodomor gives 4.469 million, of which 3.238 million (or more realistically 3 to 3.5 million) is the number of the direct deaths according to this estimate.

A 2002 study by Vallin et alJacques Vallin, France Mesle, Serguei Adamets, Serhii Pyrozhkov, [http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a713779166~db=all~order=page A New Estimate of Ukrainian Population Losses during the Crises of the 1930s and 1940s] , "Population Studies", Vol. 56, No. 3. (Nov., 2002), pp. 249-264] utilizing some similar primary sources to Kulchytsky, and performing an analysis with more sophisticated demographic tools with forward projection of expected growth from the 1926 census and backward projection from the 1939 census estimate the amount of direct deaths for 1933 as 2.582 million. This number of deaths does not reflect the total demographic loss for Ukraine from these events as the fall of the birth rate during crisis and the out-migration contribute to the latter as well. The total population shortfall from the expected value between 1926 and 1939 estimated by Vallin amounted to 4.566 million. Of this number, 1.057 million is attributed to birth deficit, 930,000 to forced out-migration, and 2.582 million to excess mortality and voluntary out-migration. With the latter assumed to be negligible this estimate gives the number of deaths as the result of the 1933 famine about 2.2 million. According to this study the life expectancy for those born in 1933 sharply fell to 10.8 years for females and to 7.3 years for males and remained abnormally low for 1934 but, as commonly expected for the post-crisis peaked in 1935–36.

According to estimates about 81.3% of the famine victims in Ukrainian SRR were ethnic Ukrainians, 4.5% Russians, 1.4% Jews and 1.1% were Poles. Many Belarusians, Hungarians, Volga Germans and rest nationalities became victims as well. The Ukrainian rural population was the hardest hit by the Holodomor. Since the peasantry constituted a demographic backbone of the Ukrainian nation, [Robert Potocki, "Polityka państwa polskiego wobec zagadnienia ukraińskiego w latach 1930-1939" (in Polish, English summary), Lublin 2003, ISBN 83-917615-4-1] the tragedy deeply affected the Ukrainians for many years.

The overall number ethnic Ukrainian who died from 1932-1933 famine that took place in many regions of the USSR is estimated as 4.5 - 5 million out of 6-8 million total.,

Elimination of Ukrainian cultural elite

The famine of 1932-1933 followed the assault on Ukrainian national culture that started in 1928.Fact|date=March 2008 The events of 1932-1933 in Ukraine were seen by the Soviet Communist leaders as an instrument against Ukrainian self-determination. At the 12th Congress of the Communist Party of Ukraine, Moscow-appointed leader Pavel Postyshev declared that "1933 was the year of the defeat of Ukrainian nationalist counter-revolution." ["12th Congress of the Communist Party (Bolshevik) of Ukraine, Stenograph Record", Kharkiv 1934.] This "defeat" encompassed not just the physical extermination of a significant portion of the Ukrainian peasantry, but also the virtual elimination of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church clergy and the mass imprisonment or execution of Ukrainian intellectuals, writers and artists.

By the end of the 1930s, approximately four-fifths of the Ukrainian cultural elite had been "eliminated". [E.g. Encyclopedia Britannica, "History of Ukraine" article.] Some, like Ukrainian writer Mykola Khvylovy, committed suicide. One of the leading Ukrainian Bolsheviks, Mykola Skrypnyk, who was in charge of the decade-long Ukrainization program that had been decisively brought to an end, shot himself in the summer of 1933 at the height of the terrifying purge of the CP(b)U. The Communist Party of Ukraine, under the guidance of state officials like Kaganovich, Kosior, and Pavel Postyshev, boasted in early 1934 of the elimination of "counter-revolutionaries, nationalists, spies and class enemies". Whole academic organizations, such as the Bahaliy Institute of History and Culture, were shut down following the arrests.

In the 1920s, the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC) had gained a significant following amongst the Ukrainian peasants due to the Soviet policy of weakening the position of the Russian Orthodox Church (see History of Christianity in Ukraine). Nonetheless, in the late 1920s the Soviet authorities closed thousands of parishes and repressed the clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox church. By 1930 the church was taken off the Soviet Registry and the NKVD made sure that it did not exist unofficially.

Ukrainian music ensembles had their repertoires severely restricted and censored. Foreign tours by Ukrainian artists were canceled without explanation. Many artists were arrested and detained often for months at a time without cause. After not receiving any pay for many months, many choirs and artistic ensembles such as the Kiev and Poltava Bandurist Capellas ceased to exist. Blind traditional folk musicians known as kobzars were summoned from all of Ukraine to an ethnographic conference and disappeared (See Persecuted bandurists).

Repression of the intelligentsia occurred in virtually all parts of the USSR. [Roy Medvedev writes "Instead, Stalin once again looked for a scapegoat and found it in the form of the specialists from among the pre-revolutionary Russian (and Ukrainian) intelligentsia"
Roy Medvedev, "Let History Judge: The Origins and Consequences of Stalinism", "Columbia University Press", 1989, ISBN 0231063504, p. 256-258.] Despite the assault, education and publishing in the republic remained Ukrainianized for the years to come. In 1935-36, 83% of all school children in the Ukrainian SSR were taught in Ukrainian even though Ukrainians made up about 80% of the population. [ Ronald Grigor Suny, "The Soviet Experiment"] In 1936 from 1830 newspapers 1402 were in Ukrainian, as were 177 magazines, in 1936 69 104 thousand Ukrainian books were printed. [ "Soviet Ukraine for 20 years" p.102 Ukrainian SRR Academy of Science 1938 Kiev, also same data in Statistical Compendium 1936 ]

Was the Holodomor genocide?

Robert Conquest, the author of a Western study published prior to the declassification of the Soviet archives, concluded that the famine of 1932–33 was a deliberate act of mass murder, if not genocide committed as part of Joseph Stalin's collectivization program in the Soviet Union. In 2006, the Security Service of Ukraine declassified more than 5 thousand pages of Holodomor archives. [ [http://ssu.kmu.gov.ua/sbu/control/uk/publish/article?art_id=49757&cat_id=63245 Служба безпеки України ] ] These documents suggest that the Soviet Regime singled out Ukraine, while regions outside it were allowed to receive humanitarian aid. [ [http://5tv.com.ua/eng/newsline/184/0/33564/ SBU documents show that Moscow singled out Ukraine in famine] 5tv - Ukraine Channel Five. 22 November 2006. Retrieved 23 November 2006] Some scholars says that Conquest's book on the famine is replete with errors and inconsistencies and that it deserves to be considered an expression of the Cold War. [Mark Tauger. Published correspondence ( [http://www.as.wvu.edu/history/Faculty/Tauger/Tauger,%20on%20famines%20and%20scholarship,%20H-Russia%2004.16.02,%20my%20p.pdf pdf] )]

R.W. Davies and Stephen G. Wheatcroft have interacted with Conquest and note that he no longer considers the famine "deliberate". ["Debate: Stalin and the Soviet Famine of 1932-33: A Reply to Ellman", in Europe-Asia Studies, vol. 58, No. 4, June 2006, pp.625-633. (note on conquest (p. 629))] Conquest -- and, by extension, Davies and Wheatcroft -- believe that, had industrialization been abandoned, the famine would have been "prevented" (Conquest), or at least significantly alleviated.

:"...we regard the policy of rapid industrialization as an underlying cause of the agricultural troubles of the early 1930s, and we do not believe that the Chinese or NEP versions of industrialization were viable in Soviet national and international circumstances." ["Debate: Stalin and the Soviet Famine of 1932-33: A Reply to Ellman", in Europe-Asia Studies, vol. 58, No. 4, June 2006, pp.625-633. (p. 626))]

They see the leadership under Stalin as making significant errors in planning for the industrialization of agriculture.

Davies and Wheatcroft also cite an unpublished letter by Robert Conquest:

:"Our view of Stalin and the famine is close to that of Robert Conquest, who would earlier have been considered the champion of the argument that Stalin had intentionally caused the famine and had acted in a genocidal manner. In 2003, Dr Conquest wrote to us explaining that he does not hold the view that "Stalin purposely incited the 1933 famine. No. What I argue is that with resulting famine imminent, he could have prevented it, but put ‘Soviet interest’ other than feeding the starving first—thus consciously abetting it"." [Davies, R.W. & Wheatcroft, S.G. (2004) The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931 – 1933 (Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan), p 441, n. 145.]

This retraction by Conquest is also noted by Kulchytsky.

Some historians maintain that the famine was an unintentional consequence of collectivization, and that the associated resistance to it by the Ukrainian peasantry exacerbated an already-poor harvest.See also the [http://www.as.wvu.edu/history/Faculty/Tauger/soviet.htm acrimonious exchange between Tauger and Conquest] .] Some researchers state that while the term Ukrainian Genocide is often used in application to the event, technically, the use of the term "genocide" is inapplicable.

The statistical distribution of famine's victims among the ethnicities closely reflects the ethnic distribution of the "rural population of Ukraine"Stanislav Kulchytsky, Hennadiy Yefimenko. [http://www.history.org.ua/kul/contents.htm Демографічні наслідки голодомору 1933 р. в Україні. Всесоюзний перепис 1937 р. в Україні: документи та матеріали] (Demographic consequence of Holodomor of 1933 in Ukraine. The all-Union census of 1937 in Ukraine), Kiev, Institute of History, 2003. pp.63-72] Moldavian, Polish, German and Bulgarian population that mostly resided in the rural communities of Ukraine suffered in the same proportion as the rural Ukrainian population. While ethnic Russians in Ukraine lived mostly in urban areas and the cities were affected little by the famine, the rural Russian population was affected the same way as the rural population of any other ethnicity.

According to University of West Virginia professor Dr Mark Tauger, any analysis that asserts that the harvests of 1931 and 1932 were not extraordianrily low and that the famine was a political measure intentionally imposed through excessive procurements is clearly based on an insufficient source base and an uncritical approach to the official sources.

Politicization of Holodomor

The originator of the term "genocide", Raphael Lemkin, was a featured speaker at the manifestation of Ukrainian-Americans in September, 1953 to mark the twentieth anniversary of the Ukrainian Famine. Although the term was first introduced in 1943 a legal definition was only developed in 1948. Since then the heads of state, governments or parliaments of countries including Ukraine, Argentina, Australia, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, the Czech Republic, [ [http://www.podrobnosti.com.ua/society/2007/12/01/478522.html Podrobnosti] ] Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Mexico, Moldova, Paraguay, Peru, Poland, Spain, United States, and Vatican City, consider the 1932–1933 famine as an act of genocide. Scholars have documented that the Soviet famine of 1932-33 affected other nationalities. The 2004 book "The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931-1933" by R.W. Davies and S.G. Wheatcroft gives an estimate of around 5.5 to 6.5 million deaths in the 1932–1933 famine throughout the Soviet Union.Davies and Wheatcroft, p. 401] Still, the Holodomor remains a politically-charged topic.

The term democide, introduced by the academic R.J. Rummel, is "the murder of any person or people by a government, "including" genocide, politicide, and mass murder". [Robert J. Rummel, [http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/DBG.CHAP2.HTM Death by government] , New Brunswick, N.J. : Transactions Publishers, 1994, ISBN 1560001453] One view claims that the famine primarily affected the rural population of Ukraine. However, in 1932, 75% to 85% of the Ukrainian population resided in villages.cite journal | first = John-Paul | last = Himka | authorlink = John-Paul Himka | year =2005 | month = | title = War Criminality: A Blank Spot in the Collective Memory of the Ukrainian Diaspora | journal = Spaces of Identity | volume = 5 | issue = 1 | pages = 5–24 | issn = 1496-6778 | url= http://www.yorku.ca/soi/_Vol_5_1/_PDF/Himka.pdf | quote = I am not saying that the famine or the other components of the victimization narratives do not deserve historical research and reflection, nor that evil should be ignored, nor that the memory of the dead should not be held sacred. But I object to instrumentalizing this memory with the aim of generating political and moral capital, particularly when it is linked to an exclusion from historical research and reflection of events in which Ukrainians figured as perpetrators not victims, and when “our own” evil is kept invisible and the memory of the others’ dead is not held sacred.|format=PDF]

According to the US Government Commission on the Ukrainian Famine, [ [http://www.faminegenocide.com/resources/findings.html Findings of the Commission on the Ukraine Famine] ] the seizure of the 1932 crop by the Soviet authorities was the main reason for the famine. The US commission stated that "while famine took place during the 1932-1933 agricultural year in the Volga Basin and the North Caucasus Territory as a whole, the invasiveness of Stalin's interventions of both the Fall of 1932 and January 1933 in Ukraine are paralleled only in the ethnically Ukrainian Kuban region of the North Caucasus".

At the international conference of the Ukrainian Holodomor, which was held in October 2003 at the Institute of Social and Religious History of Vicenza, 28 conference participants that included the well-respected historians like James Mace, Hubert Laszkiewicz, Andrea Graziosi, Yuriy Shapoval, Gerhard Simon, Orest Subtelny, Mauro Martini, etc. - endorsed a resolution addressed to the Italian government and the European Parliament with a request to recognize the Holodomor as an act of genocide against the Ukrainian people. [ [http://www.aisu.it/convegni/vicenza.pdf "Convegno internazionale di studi La grande carestia, la fame e la morte della terra nell'Ucraina del 1932-33"] ] [ [http://www.artukraine.com/famineart/mace23.htm "The Great Famine-Genocide in Soviet Ukraine (Holodomor)"] ]

On May 15, 2003, the Verkhovna Rada (parliament) of Ukraine also passed a resolution declaring the famine of 1932–1933 an act of genocide, deliberately organized by the Soviet government against the Ukrainian nation.Fact|date=March 2008 On November 26, 2006 the Ukrainian Parliament approved a bill, according to which "the Soviet-era forced famine was an act of genocide against the Ukrainian people". [cite news | last = Lisova | first = Natasha | title = Ukraine Recognize Famine As Genocide | publisher = The Associated Press | date= 2006-11-28 | url = http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/28/AR2006112800658.html | accessdate = 2006-11-29] In 2007 president Viktor Yushchenko proposed a law that would criminalize denial of Holodomor. However, the law was never voted by the parliament.

Governments and parliaments of several of other countriesm have also officially recognized the Holodomor as an act of genocide.United States Commission on the Ukraine Famine, "Findings of the Commission on the Ukraine Famine" [http://www.faminegenocide.com/resources/findings.html] , Report to Congress, Washington, D.C., April 19 1988] [http://ucca.org/uccanews/story/1116051811.shtml US House of Representatives Authorizes Construction of Ukrainian Genocide Monument] ] [http://www.skrobach.com/ukrhol.htm Statement by Pope John Paul II on the 70th anniversary of the Famine] ] [http://www.artukraine.com/famineart/uscongr4.htm HR356 "Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives regarding the man-made famine that occurred in Ukraine in 1932–1933"] , United States House of Representatives, Washington, D.C., October 21, 2003] Countries whose government recognize Holodomor as Genocide are Argentina [http://www1.hcdn.gov.ar/folio-cgi-bin/om_isapi.dll?clientID=1679593240&E1=&E11=&E12=&E13=&E14=&E15=&E16=&E17=&E18=hambruna%20ucrania&E19=&E2=senado&E3=&E5=declaracion&E6=aprobado&E7=&E9=&headingswithhits=on&infobase=proy99.nfo&querytemplate=Consulta%20de%20Proyectos%20Parlamentarios&record={F341}&recordswithhits=on&softpage=Doc_Frame_Pg42&submit=ejecutar] , Australia [http://parlinfoweb.aph.gov.au/piweb/view_document.aspx?ID=38766&TABLE=JOURNALS] [http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/work/journals/2003/jnlp_114.pdf] , Azerbaijan [http://jamestown.org/edm/article.php?article_id=2371016] , Belgium [http://www.ukraine.be/famin/c030403.html] , Canada [http://www.parl.gc.ca/37/2/parlbus/chambus/senate/jour-e/pdf/072jr_2003-06-19.pdf] , Estonia [http://www.vm.ee/est/kat_137/5260.html] , Georgia [http://www.parliament.ge/index.php?lang_id=ENG&sec_id=89&info_id=8347&date=2005-12-20&new_month=12&new_year=2005] , Hungary [http://www.mkogy.hu/irom37/6288/6288.htm] , Italy [http://banchedati.camera.it/sindacatoispettivo/ShowXml2Html.Asp?IdAtto=90369&Stile=5&HighLight=1&SearchType=1&Originale=0] ,
Latvia [http://www.mk.gov.lv/en/aktuali/zinas/2005/11/28112005/] , Lithuania [http://www3.lrs.lt/pls/inter3/dokpaieska.showdoc_e?p_id=266526&p_query=&p_tr2=] , Moldova [http://jamestown.org/edm/article.php?article_id=2371016] , Poland [http://www.senat.gov.pl/K6/dok/dr/050/a/090s.pdf#search='SPRAWOZDANIE%20KOMISJI%20USTAWODAWCZEJ%20KOMISJI%20SPRAW%20ZAGRANICZNYCH%20%20%20o%20projekcie%20uchwa%C5%82y%20w%20sprawie%20rocznicy%20Wielkiego%20G%C5%82odu%20na%20Ukrainie%20%28druk%20nr%2090%29] , United States [http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=109_cong_bills&docid=f:h562rfs.txt.pdf] and the Vatican [http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/speeches/2001/documents/hf_jp-ii_spe_20010623_ucraina-meeting_en.html] ]

At the conference on "Recognition and Denial of Genocide and Mass Killing in the 20th Century," held at City University of New York on 13 November 1987, it was stated that Soviet Ukraine suffered a man-made famine in 1932–1933, during which millions died. As the United States Government Commission concluded this was part of the central governments's attack on Ukrainian nationality and culture. The United States Government received numerous contemporary intelligence reports on the famine from its European embassies, but chose not to acknowledge the famine publicly. Similarly, leading members of the American press corps in the Soviet Union willfully covered up the famine in their dispatches. In both cases, political considerations relating to the establishment of diplomatic relations with the U.S.S.R. seem to have been critical factors in this cover-up. [ [http://hgs.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/3/1/75 THE POLITICS OF FAMINE: AMERICAN GOVERNMENT AND PRESS RESPONSE TO THE UKRAINIAN FAMINE, 1932–1933] Holocaust and Genocide Studies]

The Russian Federation officially says that the Holodomor not an ethnic genocide and the State Duma passed a resolution on the subject in 2008 saying it should not be considered genocide - "There is no historical proof that the famine was organized along ethnic lines. Its victims were million of citizens of the Soviet Union, representing different peoples and nationalities living largely in agricultural areas of the country," the Russian State Duma resolution said.Steve Gutterman, [http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5g24G2C82bayPydlhVXF5FYjM5PjQD8VPUNCG0 Russia: 1930s Famine Was Not Genocide] , "Associated Press", Apr 2, 2008] Russian politician Mikhail Kamynin has claimed that Russia is against the politicisation of the Holodomor, and this question is for historians, not politicians.News Ru " [http://www.newsru.com/russia/05dec2006/golodomor.html Russia owes Ukraine no apologies" thinks vice-speaker of the Duma] " Released on 5th of December, 2006.] Simultaneously the vice-speaker of the Russian State Duma, Lyubov Sliska, when asked in Kiev when Russia would apologize for its part in repressions and famines in Ukraine, replied, "why always insist that Russia apologize for everything? The people whose policies brought suffering not only to Ukraine, but to Russia, Belarus, peoples of the Caucasus, and Crimean Tatars, remain only in history textbooks, secret documents and minutes of meetings." Ukrainian mass media censured Evgeny Guzeev, the Consul-General of the Russian Federation in Lviv, who stated that "the leaders of the period were sensible people, and it is impossible to imagine that this was planned."Borysov, Dmytro "Russian diplomat denies the Holodomor" Lvivska Hazeta 29.11.2005 [http://www.gazeta.lviv.ua/articles/2005/11/29/11105/] uk icon]

On November 17 2007 members from Aleksandr Dugin's radical Russian nationalist group the Eurasian Youth Union broke into the Ukrainian cultural center in Moscow and smashed an exhibition on the famine. [http://www.ukranews.com/eng/article/81214.html Ukraine Demanding That Russia Punish Eurasian Youth Union Members For Smashing Famine Exhibition In Moscow] ]

The final report of the "International Commission of Inquiry Into the 1932–33 Famine in Ukraine", delivered to the UN Under-Secretary for Human Rights in Geneva on May 9, 1990, concluded that the famine in Ukraine was, in fact, genocide. [http://www.ioir.se/ukrfamine.htm International Commission of Inquiry Into the 1932–33 Famine in Ukraine by Prof. Jacob Sundberg] ] At same time the commission majority (5 of 6) deems it plausible that the constituent elements of genocide were in existence at the time of the famine. [ Final Report of International Commission of Inquiry Into the 1932–33 Famine in Ukraine p.9 http://www.ukrainianworldcongress.org/Holodomor/Holodomor-Commission.pdf ] Commission is unable to affirm the existence of a preconceived plan to organize a famine in the Ukraine, in order to ensure the success of Moscow policies. [ Final Report of International Commission of Inquiry Into the 1932–33 Famine in Ukraine p.48 http://www.ukrainianworldcongress.org/Holodomor/Holodomor-Commission.pdf ]

A significant step in the world recognition of Holodomor was the "Joint declaration at the United Nations in connection with 70th anniversary of the Great Famine in Ukraine 1932-1933" (10 November 2003), [] evaluating the Holodomor as a great tragedy. According to Valery Kuchinsky, the chief Ukrainian representative at the United Nations the declaration was a compromise between the positions of Great Britain, United States and Russia denying that Holodomor was a genocide and the position of Ukraine that insisted on recognition of Holodomor as a form of genocide.

On 3 July, 2008 the Parliamentary Assembly of OSCE passed the resolution condemning the Ukrainian famine acknowledging the direct responsibility of the Soviet action. The resolution called upon all parliaments to take measures on recognition of the fact of Holodomor in Ukraine but fell short of recognizing it as an act of genocide as requested by the document prepared by the Ukrainian delegation. [ [http://www.newsru.com/world/03jul2008/golodomor.html ПА ОБСЕ приняла резолюцию по голодомору на Украине. Геноцидом он не признан] , "Newsru.com", 3 July 2008 г.] [ [http://korrespondent.net/ukraine/politics/511316 ПА ОБСЕ приняла резолюцию по Голодомору в Украине] , "korrespondent.net", 3 July 2008]

Comprehending the famine

The famine remains a politically-charged topic; hence, heated debates are likely to continue for a long time. Until around 1990, the debates were largely between the so called "denial camp" who refused to recognize the very existence of the famine or stated that it was caused by natural reasons (such as a poor harvest), scholars who accepted reports of famine but saw it as a policy blunder [J. Arch Getty, "The Future Did Not Work", "The Atlantic Monthly", Boston: March 2000, Vol. 285, Iss.3, pg.113] followed by the botched relief effort, and scholars who alleged that it was intentional and specifically anti-Ukrainian or even an act of genocide against the Ukrainians as a nation.

Nowadays, scholars agree that the famine affected millions. While it is also accepted that the famine affected other nationalities in addition to Ukrainians, the debate is still ongoing as to whether or not the Holodomor qualifies as an act of genocide, since the facts that the famine itself took place and that it was unnatural are not disputed. As far as the possible effect of the natural causes, the debate is restricted to whether the poor harvest or post-traumatic stress played any role at all and to what degree the Soviet actions were caused by the country's economic and military needs as viewed by the Soviet leadership.

Still, the Holodomor issue is politicized within the framework of uneasy relations between Russia and Ukraine (and also between various regional and social groups within Ukraine). Russian political interests and their supporters in Ukraine have reasons to deny the deliberate character of the disaster and play down its scale.Fact|date=December 2007

In 2007, President Viktor Yushchenko declared he wants "a new law criminalising Holodomor denial," while Communist Party head Petro Symonenko said he "does not believe there was any deliberate starvation at all," and accused Yushchenko of "using the famine to stir up hatred." Few in Ukraine share Symonenko's interpretation of history and the number of Ukrainians who deny the famine or view it as caused by natural reasons is steadily falling. [ [http://www.korrespondent.net/main/217288 Большинство украинцев считают Голодомор актом геноцида] , "Korrespondent.net", November 20, 2007] .

On November 10, 2003 at the United Nations twenty-five countries including Russia, Ukraine and United States signed a joint statement on the seventieth anniversary of the Holodomor with the following preamble:

In the former Soviet Union millions of men, women and children fell victims to the cruel actions and policies of the totalitarian regime. The Great Famine of 1932-1933 in Ukraine (Holodomor), which took from 7 million to 10 million innocent lives and became a national tragedy for the Ukrainian people. In this regard we note activities in observance of the seventieth anniversary of this Famine, in particular organized by the Government of Ukraine.
Honouring the seventieth anniversary of the Ukrainian tragedy, we also commemorate the memory of millions of Russians, Kazakhs and representatives of other nationalities who died of starvation in the Volga River region, Northern Caucasus, Kazakhstan and in other parts of the former Soviet Union, as a result of civil war and forced collectivization, leaving deep scars in the consciousness of future generations. [ [http://www.artukraine.com/famineart/ukr_un_decl.htm Joint Statement on the Great Famine of 1932-1933 in Ukraine (Holodomor) on Monday, November 10, 2003 at the United Nations in New York] ]

The Ukrainian communities are sometimes criticized for using the term Holodomor, Ukrainian Genocide, or even "Ukrainian Holocaust", to appropriate the larger-scale tragedy of collectivization as their own national terror-famine, thus exploiting it for political purposes. [Vasili Hryshko, Marco Carynnyk, "The Ukrainian Holocaust of 1933", Bahriany Foundation, 1983, ISBN 0969183003] [Robert Conquest, "The Man-made Famine in Ukraine", American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1984, ISBN 0844735523] [James Mace, "Soviet Man-Made Famine in Ukraine", chapter 3 in "Century of Genocide: Critical Essays and Eyewitness Accounts", Routledge, 2004, ISBN 0415944309]

One of the biggest arguments is that the famine was preceded by the onslaught on the Ukrainian national culture, a common historical detail preceding many centralized actions directed against the nations as a whole. Nation-wide, the political repression of 1937 (The Great Purge) under the guidance of Nikolay Yezhov were known for their ferocity and ruthlessness, but Lev Kopelev wrote, "In Ukraine 1937 began in 1933", referring to the comparatively early beginning of the Soviet crackdown in Ukraine. [cite book | first= Orest| last= Subtelny | title=Ukraine: A History | location= Toronto | publisher=University of Toronto Press,| year=1988 | id=ISBN 0-80205-808-6 ] .

While the famine was well documented at the time, its reality has been disputed for ideological reasons, for instance by the Soviet government and its spokespeople (as well as apologists for the Soviet regime), by others due to being deliberately misled by the Soviet government (such as George Bernard Shaw), and, in at least one case, Walter Duranty, for personal gain.

An example of a late-era Holodomor objector is Canadian and journalist Douglas Tottle, author of "Fraud, Famine and Fascism: The Ukrainian Genocide Myth from Hitler to Harvard" (published by Moscow-based Soviet publisher Progress Publishers in 1987). Tottle claims that while there were severe economic hardships in Ukraine, the idea of the Holodomor was fabricated as propaganda by Nazi Germany and William Randolph Hearst to justify a German invasion.

Remembrance

To honour those who perished in the Holodomor, monuments have been dedicated and public events held annually in Ukraine and worldwide. The fourth Saturday in November is the official day of remembrance for people who died as a result of Holodomor and political repression. [Bradley, Lara. "Ukraine's 'Forced Famine' Officially Recognized. "The Sundbury Star". 3 January 1999. [http://www.artukraine.com/famineart/forcedfam.htm URL Accessed 12 October 2006] ]

In 2006, the Holodomor Remembrance Day took place on November 25. President Viktor Yushchenko directed, in decree No. 868/2006, that a minute of silence should be observed at 4 o'clock in the afternoon on that Saturday. The document specified that flags in Ukraine should fly at half-staff as a sign of mourning. In addition, the decree directed that entertainment events are to be restricted and television and radio programming adjusted accordingly. [Yushchenko, Viktor. Decree No. 868/2006 by President of Ukraine. [http://www.prezident.gov.ua/documents/5087.html "Regarding the Remembrance Day in 2006 for people who died as a result of Holodomor and political repressions"] uk icon]

In 2007, the 75th anniversary of the Holodomor was commemorated in Kiev for three days on the Maidan Nezalezhnosti. As part of the three day event, from November 23-25th, video testimonies of the communist regime's crimes in Ukraine, and documentaries by famous domestic and foreign film directors are being shown. Additionally, experts and scholars gave lectures on the topic. ["Ceremonial events to commemorate Holodomor victims to be held in Kiev for three days." National Radio Company of Ukraine. [http://www.nrcu.gov.ua/index.php?id=148&listid=55808 URL Accessed 25 November 2007] ] Additionally, on November 23 2007, the National Bank of Ukraine issued a set of two commemorative coins remembering the Holodomor. [Commemorative Coins "Holodomor – Genocide of the Ukrainian People". National Bank of Ukraine. [http://www.bank.gov.ua/ENGL/Bank_coin/YUV_MON/Coins/Other/Golodomor.htm URL Accessed 25 June 2008] ]

On November 17 2007 members from Aleksandr Dugin's radical Russian nationalist group the Eurasian Youth Union broke into the Ukrainian cultural center in Moscow and smashed an exhibition on the famine.

ee also

*Famines in Russia and USSR

References

External links

Declarations and legal acts

* [http://www.faminegenocide.com/resources/findings.html Findings of the Commission on the Ukraine Famine] , U.S. Commission on the Ukraine Famine, Report to Congress. Adopted by the Commission, April 19 1988
*
* [http://zakon.rada.gov.ua/cgi-bin/laws/main.cgi?nreg=789%2D15 Address of the Verkhovna Rada to the Ukrainian nation on commemorating the victims of Holodomor 1932-1933 (in Ukrainian)]

Books and articles

* Ammende, Ewald, "Human life in Russia, (Cleveland: J.T. Zubal, 1984), Reprint, Originally published: London, England: Allen & Unwin, 1936. * «The Black Deeds of the Kremlin: a white book», S.O. Pidhainy, Editor-In-Chief, (Toronto: Ukrainian Association of Victims of Russian-Communist Terror, 1953), (Vol. 1 Book of testimonies. Vol. 2. The Great Famine in Ukraine in 1932—1933). * Conquest, Robert, «The Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror — Famine», (Edmonton: The University of Alberta Press in Association with the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, 1986). * Davies, R.W., «The Socialist offensive: the collectivization of Soviet agriculture, 1929—1930», (London: Macmillan, 1980). * «Der ukrainische Hunger-Holocaust: Stalins verschwiegener Volkermond 1932/33 an 7 Millionen ukrainischen Bauern im Spiegel geheimgehaltener Akten des deutschen Auswartigen Amtes», (Sonnebuhl: H. Wild, 1988), By Dmytro Zlepko. [eine Dokumentation, herausgegeben und eingeleitet von Dmytro Zlepko] . * Dolot, Miron, «Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust, a survivor's account of the Famine of 1932—1933 in Ukraine», (New York City: W.W. Norton & Company Inc., 1985). * Dolot, Miron, «Who killed them and why?: in remembrance of those killed in the Famine of 1932—1933 in Ukraine», (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University, Ukrainian Studies Fund, 1984). * Dushnyk, Walter, «50 years ago: the famine holocaust in Ukraine», (New York: Toronto: World Congress of Free Ukrainians, 1983). * «Famine in the Soviet Ukraine 1932—1933: a memorial exhibition», Widener Library, Harvard University, prepared by Oksana Procyk, Leonid Heretz, James E. Mace. — (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard College Library, distributed by Harvard University Press, 1986). * «Famine in Ukraine 1932-33», edited by Roman Serbyn and Bohdan Krawchenko, — (Edmonton: Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, 1986). [Selected papers from a conference held at the Universite du Quebec a Montreal in 1983). * «The Great Famine in Ukraine: the unknown holocaust: in solemn observance of the Ukrainian famine of 1932—1933», (Compiled and edited by the editors of the Ukrainian Weekly [Roma Hadzewycz, George B. Zarycky, Martha Kolomayets] Jersey City, N.J.: Ukrainian National Association, 1983). * Gregorovich, Andrew, «Black Famine in Ukraine 1932-33: A Struggle for Existence», FORUM: A Ukrainian Review, No. 24, (Scranton: Ukrainian Workingmen's Association, 1974). * Halii, Mykola, «Organized famine in Ukraine, 1932—1933», (Chicago: Ukrainian Research and Information Institute, 1963). * «Holod na Ukraini, 1932—1933: vybrani statti», uporiadkuvala Nadiia Karatnyts'ka, (New York: Suchasnist', 1985). * Hlushanytsia, Pavlo, "Tretia svitova viina Pavla Hlushanytsi = The third world war of Pavlo Hlushanytsia, translated by Vera Moroz, (Toronto: Anabasis Magazine, 1986). [Bilingual edition in Ukrainian and English] . * «Holod 1932-33 rokiv na Ukraini: ochyma istorykiv, movoij dokumentiv», (Kyiv: Vydavnytstvo politychnoyi literatury Ukrainy, 1990). * Hryshko, Vasyl, «Ukrains'kyi 'Holokast', 1933», (New York: DOBRUS; Toronto: SUZHERO, 1978). * Hryshko, Vasyl, «The Ukrainian Holocaust of 1933», Edited and translated by Marco Carynnyk, (Toronto: Bahrianyi Foundation, SUZHERO, DOBRUS, 1983). * «International Commission of Inquiry into the 1932-33 Famine in Ukraine, Proceedings [transcript] », May 23-27, 1988, Brussels, Belgium, [Jakob W.F. Sundberg, President; Legal Counsel, World Congress of Free Ukrainians: John Sopinka, Alexandra Chyczij; Legal Council for the Commission, Ian A. Hunter, 1988. * «International Commission of Inquiry into the 1932-33 Famine in Ukraine. Proceedings [transcript] », October 21 — November 5, 1988, New York City, [Jakob W.F. Sundberg, President; Counsel for the Petitioner, William Liber; General Counsel, Ian A. Hunter] , 1988. * «International Commission of Inquiry into the 1932—1933 Famine in Ukraine. Final report», [Jacob W.F. Sundberg, President] , 1990. [Proceedings of the International Commission of Inquiry and its Final report are in typescript, contained in 6 vols. Copies available from the World Congress of Free Ukrainians, Toronto] . * Kalynyk, Oleksa, «Communism, the enemy of mankind: documents about the methods and practise of Russian Bolshevik occupation in Ukraine», (London, England: The Ukrainian Youth Association in Great Britain, 1955). * Klady, Leonard, "Famine Film «Harvest of Despair»", FORUM: A Ukrainian Review, No. 61, Spring 1985, (Scranton: Ukrainian Fraternal Association, 1985). * «Kolektyvizatsia і Holod na Ukraini 1929—1933: Zbirnyk documentiv і materialiv», Z.M. Mychailycenko, E.P. Shatalina, S.V. Kulcycky, eds., (Kyiv: Naukova Dumka, 1992). * Kostiuk, Hryhory, «Stalinist rule in Ukraine: a study of the decade of mass terror, 1929—1939», (Munich: Institut zur Erforschung der UdSSSR, 1960). * Kovalenko, L.B. & Maniak, B.A., eds., «Holod 33: Narodna knyha-memorial», (Kyiv: Radians'kyj pys'mennyk, 1991). * Krawchenko, Bohdan, «Social change and national consciousness in twentieth-century Ukraine», (Basingstoke: Macmillan in association with St. Anthony's College, Oxford, 1985). * «Lettere da Kharkov: la carestia in Ucraina e nel Caucaso del Nord nei rapporti dei diplomatici italiani, 1932-33», a cura di Andrea Graziosi, (Torino: Einaudi, 1991). * Mace, James E., «Communism and the dilemma of national liberation: national communism in Soviet Ukraine, 1918—1933», (Cambridge, Mass.: Distributed by Harvard University Press for the Ukrainian Research Institute and the Ukrainian Academy of Arts and Sciences in the U.S., 1983). * Makohon, P., «Svidok: Spohady pro 33-ho», (Toronto: Anabasis Magazine, 1983). * Martchenko, Borys, «La famine-genocide en Ukraine: 1932—1933», (Paris: Publications de l'Est europeen, 1983). * Marunchak, Mykhailo H., "Natsiia v botot'bi za svoie isnuvannia: 1932 і 1933 v Ukraini і diiaspori, (Winnipeg: Nakl. Ukrains'koi vil'noi akademii nauk v Kanadi, 1985).

* «Memorial», compiled by Lubomyr Y. Luciuk and Alexandra Chyczij; translated into English by Marco Carynnyk, (Toronto: Published by Kashtan Press for Canadian Friends of «Memorial», 1989). [Bilingual edition in Ukrainian and English. this is a selection of resolutions, aims and objectives, and other documents, pertaining to the activities of the «memorial» Society in Ukraine] . * Mishchenko, Oleksandr, «Bezkrovna viina: knyha svidchen'», (Kyiv: Molod', 1991). * Oleksiw, Stephen, «The agony of a nation: the great man-made famine in Ukraine, 1932—1933», (London: The National Committee to Commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the Artificial Famine in Ukraine, 1932—1933, 1983). * «Pavel P. Postyshev, envoy of Moscow in Ukraine 1933—1934», [selected newspaper articles, documents, and sections in books] , (Toronto: World Congress of Free Ukrainians, Secretariat, [1988] ), (The 1932-33 Famine in Ukraine research documentation. * Pidnayny, Alexandra, «A bibliography of the great famine in Ukraine, 1932—1933», (Toronto: New Review Books, 1975). * Pravoberezhnyi, Fedir, «8,000,000: 1933-i rik na Ukraini», (Winnipeg: Kultura і osvita, 1951). * Senyshyn, Halyna, «Bibliohrafia holody v Ukraini 1932—1933», (Ottawa: Montreal: UMMAN, 1983). * Solovei, Dmytro, «The Golgotha of Ukraine: eye-witness accounts of the famine in Ukraine», compiled by Dmytro Soloviy, (New York: Ukrainian Congress Committee of America, 1953). * Stradnyk, Petro, «Pravda pro soviets'ku vladu v Ukraini», (New York: N. Chyhyryns'kyi, 1972). * Taylor, S.J., «Stalin's apologist: Walter Duranty, the New York Time's man in Moscow», (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990). * «The Foreign Office and the famine: British documents on Ukraine and the great famine of 1932—1933», edited by Marco Carynnyk, Lubomyr Y. Luciuk and Bohdan Kor. * «The man-made famine in Ukraine», — (Washington D.C.: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1984). [Seminar. Participants: Robert Conquest, Dana Dalrymple, James Mace, Michael Nowak] . * United States, «Commission on the Ukraine Famine. Investigation of the Ukrainian Famine, 1932—1933: report to Congress / Commission on the Ukraine Famine», [Daniel E. Mica, Chairman; James E. Mace, Staff Director] . — (Washington D.C.: U.S. G.P.O.: For sale by the Supt. of Docs, U.S. G.P.O., 1988), (Dhipping list: 88-521-P). * United States, «Commission on the Ukrainian Famine. Oral history project of the Commission on the Ukraine Famine», James E. Mace and Leonid Heretz, eds. (Washington, D.C.: Supt. of Docs, U.S. G.P.O., 1990). * «Velykyi holod v Ukraini, 1932-33: zbirnyk svidchen', spohadiv, dopovidiv ta stattiv, vyholoshenykh ta drukovanykh v 1983 rotsi na vidznachennia 50-littia holodu v Ukraini — The Great Famine in Ukraine 1932—1933: a collection of memoirs, speeches amd essays prepared in 1983 in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Famine in Ukraine during 1932-33», [Publication Committee members: V. Rudenko, T. Khokhitva, P. Makohon, F. Podopryhora] , (Toronto: Ukrains'ke Pravoslavne Bratstvo Sv. Volodymyra, 1988), [Bilingual edition in Ukrainian and English] . * Verbyts'kyi, M., «Naibil'shyi zlochyn Kremlia: zaplianovanyi shtuchnyi holod v Ukraini 1932—1933 rokiv», (London, England: DOBRUS, 1952). * Voropai, Oleksa, «V deviatim kruzi», (London, England: Sum, 1953). * Voropai, Oleksa, « The Ninth Circle: In Commemoration of the Victims of the Famine of 1933», Olexa Woropay; edited with an introduction by James E. Mace, (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University, Ukrainian Studies Fund, 1983). * Marco Carynnyk, Lubomyr Luciuk and Bohdan S Kordan, eds, "The Foreign Office and the Famine: British Documents on Ukraine and the Great Famine of 1932-1933, f"oreword by Michael Marrus (Kingston: Limestone Press, 1988) * Robert Conquest, [http://www.ditext.com/conquest/harvest.html"The Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror-Famine"] Oxford University Press New York (1987) ISBN 0195051807 * Robert W. Davies; Wheatcroft, Stephen G., The Years of Hunger. Soviet Agriculture 1931-1933, Houndmills 2004 ISBN 3-412-10105-2, also ISBN 0-333-31107-8 * Robert W. Davies; Wheatcroft, Stephen G., Stalin and the Soviet Famine of 1932-33 - A Reply to Ellman, in: Europe-Asia Studies Vol. 58 (2006), 4, pp. 625-633. * Miron Dolot, EXECUTION BY HUNGER: THE HIDDEN HOLOCAUST, New York: W.W Norton & Company, 1985, xvi + 231 pp. ISBN 0-393-01886-5. * Barbara Falk, Sowjetische Städte in der Hungersnot 1932/33. Staatliche Ernährungspolitik und städtisches Alltagsleben (= Beiträge zur Geschichte Osteuropas 38), Köln: Böhlau Verlag 2005 ISBN 3-412-10105-2 * Wasyl Hryshko, The Ukrainian Holocaust of 1933, (Toronto: 1983, Bahriany Foundation) * Stanislav Kulchytsky, Hennadiy Yefimenko. [http://www.history.org.ua/kul/contents.htm Демографічні наслідки голодомору 1933 р. в Україні. Всесоюзний перепис 1937 р. в Україні: документи та матеріали] (Demographic consequence of Holodomor of 1933 in Ukraine. The all-Union census of 1937 in Ukraine), Kiev, Institute of History, 2003. * R. Kusnierz, [http://www.robertkusnierz.pl//wielkiglodpokazslajdow.html" - Ukraina w latach kolektywizacji i Wielkiego Glodu (1929-1933)"] , [http://www.marszalek.com.pl/index.php?m=0 " Torun"] , 2005 * Leonard Leshuk, ed, Days of Famine, Nights of Terror: Firsthand Accounts of Soviet Collectivization, 1928-1934 (Kingston: Kashtan Press, 1995) * Lubomyr Luciuk, ed, Not Worthy: Walter Duranty's Pulitzer Prize and The New York Times (Kingston: Kashtan Press, 2004) * cite book| author = Czesław Rajca | title = Głód na Ukrainie | publisher = Werset | location = Lublin/Toronto |year = 2005 | isbn=83-60133-04-2 * Stephen G. Wheatcroft: Towards Explaining the Soviet Famine of 1931-1933: Political and Natural Factors in Perspective, in: Food and Foodways Vol. 12 (2004), No. 2-3, pp. 104-136.

External links

*cite web| title =Gareth Jones' international exposure of the Holodomor, plus many related background articles| work =| url =http://www.garethjones.org/soviet_articles/| accessdate = 2006-07-05
* [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/index.php Famine in Ukraine 1932–1933] at the Central State Archive of Ukraine ( [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/photos.php photos] , [http://www.archives.gov.ua/Sections/Famine/Resources.php links] )
*Yaroslav Bilinsky, [http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a784378865~db=all~order=page Was the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-1933 Genocide?] , "Journal of Genocide Research ", 1(2), pages= 147–156 (June 1999), available at [http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a784378865~db=all~order=page external site]
* Stanislav Kulchytsky, [http://www.orangerevolution.us/blog/_archives/2005/10/25/1321907.html "Italian Research on the Holodomor"] , October 2005.
* Stanislav Kulchytsky, "Why did Stalin exterminate the Ukrainians? Comprehending the Holodomor. The position of Soviet historians" - Six part series from "Den: [http://www.day.kiev.ua/151228/ Part 1] , [http://www.day.kiev.ua/151682/ Part 2] , [http://www.day.kiev.ua/152116/ Part 3] , [http://www.day.kiev.ua/153028/ Part 4] , [http://www.day.kiev.ua/153455/ Part 5] , [http://www.day.kiev.ua/153901/ Part 6] ; [http://www.orangerevolution.us/blog/_archives/2005/12/18/1454373.html Kulchytsky on Holodomor 1-6]
*/uk icon Valeriy Soldatenko, "A starved 1933: subjectove thoughts on objective processes", Zerkalo Nedeli, June 28 - July 4 2003. Available online [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/ie/show/449/38943/ in Russian] and [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/449/38943/ in Ukrainian] .
*/uk icon Stanislav Kulchytsky's articles in Zerkalo Nedeli, Kiev, Ukraine"
**"How many of us perish in Holodomor on 1933", November 23 2002 – November 29 2002. Available online [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/nn/show/420/36833/ in Russian] and [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/420/36833/ in Ukrainian] .
**"Reasons of the 1933 famine in Ukraine. Through the pages of one almost forgotten book" Augist 16-22, 2003. Available online [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/nn/show/456/41284/ in Russian] and [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/456/41284/ in Ukrainian] .
**"Reasons of the 1933 famine in Ukraine-2", October 4 2003 – October 10 2003. Available online [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/nn/show/463/42742/ in Russian] and [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/463/42742/ in Ukrainian] .
**"Demographic losses in Ukraine in the twentieth century", October 2 2004 – October 8 2004. Available online [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/nn/show/514/47913/ in Russian] and [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/514/47913/ in Ukrainian] .
**"Holodomor-33: Why and how?" November 25 - December 1. Available online [http://www.zerkalo-nedeli.com/ie/show/624/55147/ in Russian] and [http://www.zn.kiev.ua/ie/show/624/55147/ in Ukrainian] .
* [http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/archives/ukra.html UKRAINIAN FAMINE] Revelations from the Russian Archives at the Library of Congress
* [http://gulag.ipvnews.org/article20061131.php Photos of Holodomor by Sergei Melnikoff]
* [http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2008/ga10727.doc.htm The General Committee decided this afternoon not to recommend the inclusion of an item on the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Great Famine (Holodomor) of 1932-1933 in Ukraine.]
* [http://www.massviolence.org/The-1932-1933-Great-Famine-in-Ukraine?artpage=1-5 Case Study: The Great Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33] By Nicolas Werth / CNRS - France