Dear friends and compatriots!
Today we are bowing our heads before the big tragedy of the loss of millions of Ukrainians, remembering both the tyranny of the totalitarian system and historic lie of concealing crimes against our nation. In the history of Ukraine there are wounds that never heal and victims who will never be forgotten. This everlasting pain grows stronger every day as we uncover the cruel fate of Ukraine under the misanthropic criminal communist regime.
Today the truth about the Holodomor becomes widely accessible for international community. It cannot be kept silent. The tragedy of Holodomor is recognized as a crime and condemned by many States and international organizations, regional governments and parliaments, as well as by city councils all over the world.
By intention, realization and consequences the 1932-1933 events in Ukraine fully correspond to the description that was given by the international community to the term “genocide” in the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.
It is our moral responsibility and a solemn duty before the memory of the dead, before survivors of Holodomor and before their living children and grandchildren to establish the historical justice through informing the world about the horrible page of our history, which by its magnitude cannot but transcend the limits of a purely national dimension.
On the 2 December 2013 Permanent Mission of Ukraine to the UN together with Ukrainian Congress Committee are organizing in the UN Headquarters a Commemorative conference dedicated to the 80th anniversary of Holodomor entitled “Lessons of the Past to protect the future generations: remembering those who perished in Holodomor in Ukraine, 1932-1933, and victims of all other artificial famines of the 20th and 21centuries” and you are all invited to attend.
In these November days in all Ukrainian families around the world candles will be lighted in the memory of millions of compatriots killed by Holodomor. Let us keep everlasting memory of those who perished. Let the Holodomor never return and never be forgotten. I thank you