President of Ukraine Victor Yushchenko hopes that the events on commemoration of the Holodomor 75th anniversary will help unite the nation.

According to an UNIAN correspondent, he said this at the presentation of the National Book of Memory and documentary-arts exhibition “Holodomor of 1932-33 – Genocide of Ukrainian Nation” in Kyiv on Tuesday.

Victor Yushchenko stressed that this tragic page in the history of the Ukrainian nation may help unite the nation.

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“It may create many motives for the 47 millions of Ukrainians, make them feel themselves closer to one another, feel your neighbor’s elbow, remember that we are Ukrainians, that we are a single nation, and everything will be all right”, the President said.

The President also stressed that Ukrainians should remember and study the Ukrainian history, including such tragic pages as the famine of 1932-33. He emphasized that a nation and a state cannot exist without knowing its history, culture, language, and traditions.

Victor Yushchenko called Holodomor a crime against the Ukrainian nation.

“It would be a pity if we will look at the Holodomor through the eyes of its main criminals – the Communists, and blame the God for everything, saying the God did not give the water and heat. It’s a blatant lie”, he said, adding that behind the idea of the artificial famine in Ukraine was the desire to subdue Ukrainian peasants, who are a key factor of any national liberation movement.

The President emphasized that namely the deliberate actions of Joseph Stalin, which had begun much earlier than 1933, including confiscation of lands, harvest, etc., caused the large-scale tragedy.

According to the President, during the two years of work over compiling the National Book of Memory, experts managed to establish almost 900 thousand people who died during that years, and collect more than 200 thousand testimonies of people who witnessed Holodomor. “Just imagine the scales of this tragedy, when, even 75 years after, more than 1 million of surnames was collected – it makes one feel creepy”, Victor Yushchenko said.

He expressed a belief that the today’s presentation of the first volume of the Book will make Ukrainians more interested why their grandparents died in 30ies.

Victor Yushchenko also thanked churches of different denominations and political forces who reached agreement on the Holodomor issue.

“We are Ukrainians, and we cannot call these developments anything but a genocide against the Ukrainian nation”, the President said.

He also thanked native diplomats for their great work on recognizing the Holodomor of 1932-33 at the international level.

Victor Yushchenko thanked international organizations, structures of the European Union for recognizing the Great Famine in Ukraine. He expressed a belief that this process will continue, and the world will pay tribute to the tragic developments in Ukraine.