Remembering Ukraine's History

REMEMBERING UKRAINE'S HISTORY -- (Extensions of Remarks - November 14, 2007)

SPEECH OF HON. MARCY KAPTUR OF OHIO IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 14, 2007

* Ms. KAPTUR. Madam Speaker, I rise today to record painful events in Ukraine's past. Throughout Ukraine's more than millennium-long history, it has often been attacked and occupied due to its geo-political location, fertile lands and rich natural resources. Because the Ukrainian nation continuously fought to ward off the enemies and preserve its freedom, many occupying powers resorted to oppression in order to maintain their control of Ukraine. It is widely held that one of the most brutal policies designed to subjugate Ukraine was carried out by the Stalinist regime of the former Soviet Union.

* History records that in order to suppress the numerous rebellions of the Ukrainian peasantry to the collectivization and Russification policies aggressively implemented by the Communists, Stalin set out to destroy the entire nation. His government imposed draconian grain quotas and enforced their fulfillment with brutality seldom seen in history. Secret police and specially created brigades were instructed to confiscate everything down to the last grain. They also confiscated money and any valuables in order to deprive people of any means for survival. Severe and swift punishments--often death--were delivered for any attempt to steal even a miniscule amount of grain or other foodstuffs. The Royal Consulate of Italy reported in 1933: ``through barbaric requisitions ..... the Moscow government has effectively engineered not so much a scarcity ..... but rather a complete absence of every means of subsistence throughout the Ukrainian countryside.'' Stalin also sealed off the Ukrainian border to prevent migration. In 1932, a directive was issued to arrest anyone who tried to leave Ukraine without proper documentation. According to Russian scholar Ivnitsky, 219,460 individuals were arrested per this directive and 186,588 of them were sent back to their villages to die.

* Eyewitness accounts provide vivid and gruesome details. Here is what one witness described to the House Select Committee on Communist Aggression in 1954: ``The farmers with faces and legs swollen from the hunger of the famine were invading the town and were dying in masses in the streets. The administration of the town was unable to bury the dead farmers in time, and there was a repulsive odor in the air during all this time. The police, or rather militia patrols, driving along the streets, collected the corpses. They also took those completely exhausted by starvation who arrived in town to ask for `a little bit of bread', put them on the mound of corpses saying, `you'll get there, don't worry.' I saw this all myself, and quite often.''

* It is hard and painful to comprehend that these actions were not known to the world, in part because of the denial of the famine-genocide by Soviet authorities and refusal of offers of international aid. The tragic events of 1932-1933 in Ukraine remained hidden for many decades. The world is still largely unaware of the cruelty with which the totalitarian Stalinist regime killed 7-10 million innocent people in an effort to break a people who strove for freedom and independence. The Ukrainian American community has done much to change this situation. On the occasion of the 75th Anniversary of the Ukrainian famine-genocide, we remind the world of the honors that the Ukrainian nation survived and honor the memory of the innocent victims of the inhumane policies of the Stalinist regime. Remembering the events of the past helps to ensure that this type of tragedy does not recur anywhere in the world.

Source