Swiss Parliament recognises Holodomor as genocide

The Swiss Parliament has recognised the Holodomor of 1932-1933 as an act of genocide [Holodomor was a man-made famine in Soviet Ukraine which claimed the lives of millions of Ukrainians – ed.].

In the adopted statement, Switzerland's lower house of parliament, the National Council, recognises systematic activities intended at mass and targeted starvation killing with the objective of eradicating a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group as genocide.

"This is a genuinely historical decision. And this is a critical step towards restoring historical justice and honouring the memory of millions of innocent victims," Ruslan Stefanchuk, Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada (Ukrainian Parliament), stated.

According to the Swiss parliament's website, the declaration was adopted with 123 votes, 58 parliamentarians voting against it, and 7 abstained.

According to the text, four million Ukrainians, perhaps two million Kazakhs, and hundreds of thousands of Russians died during the famine in 1932-1933.

"The National Council recognises as an act of genocide the clearly systematic actions leading to a massive and purposeful famine and committed with the intention of destroying a national, ethnic, racial or religious group as such in whole or in part," the text says.

The Holodomor was recognised as genocide of the Ukrainian people by the parliaments of about 30 countries, as well as the European Parliament and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.