Stefan Romaniv: "We need communities that will work politically to recognize the Holodomor as a genocide"

Stefan Romanov, first vice-president of the World Congress of Ukrainians (WCU), head of the commission on recognition of the Holodomor as a genocide against the Ukrainian people and chairman of the Union of Ukrainian Organizations in Australia arrived in Ukraine with a planned visit. The newspaper Den’ made an interview with a respected guest, in particular about the Holodomor-genocide, the dissemination of information about it among the international community and the statistics of victims.

We offer you an excerpt from an interview with Stefan Romaniv:

“I am leading an international committee  on recognizing the Holodomor as a genocide. 17 states of the world recognized the Holodomor as a genocide in some form. Our motto then and now is “Ukraine remembers – the world recognizes” …

There is often a debate about how many people died during the Holodomor. Given the fact that archives are now open, we also proposed creating an institution to study the number of people killed. We left this mission to the Institute, and let him study this question. For example, Jews state one amount, but we stick to the position: no matter one person or 10 million people perished – the fact is that it was a genocide and it should be condemned …

We work with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a representative of Ukraine to the UN, so that there is also the promotion of this issue. We have established good relations with government circles. We work together, we have a strategic plan. Do we do everything 100%? No. But it’s much better than ever before …

Our ambassadors and communities must work on this and submit arguments. In America, the Congress and the Senate passed a resolution recognizing the Holodomor as genocide. We did this in a way thanks to James Mace and his commission. For example, Russia and countries close to it will not recognize the Holodomor as a genocide, but there are many other states that need to be worked with. Therefore, communities that are politically working on the recognition of the Holodomor as genocide are needed. …

It should be reminded that Soviet archives were used for a while. Today, thanks to the existence of the Institute of National Memory, the SSU and other archives are now open, we can say the truth about what was hidden. If we, 60 million Ukrainians, will be as unity, we can get a lot more “.