Holodomor is a combination of the Ukrainian words holod meaning "hunger" and mor meaning "plague". In June 1933, during the height of the Holodomor, 28,000 men, women and children were dying every day. 80% of the Ukrainian people were peasants and were resisting the “collectivization,” which meant giving up their land and livestock to the state. Ukraine was under the Soviet domination at that time. Holodomor was engineered by Stalin to “teach a lesson they would never forget.”

It was so ironic that Ukraine was considered the bread basket of Europe, yet millions in the mostly ethnically Ukrainian areas were dying. The Soviet Union denied the famine while exporting enough grain to feed the entire population.

Due to a lack of records the exact number of deaths is estimated to 10 million, with about 4 million direct famine deaths and 6.1 million due to birth deficit. Debates are still ongoing whether this man-made famine falls under the legal definition of genocide.

Only by understanding the genocides of the past, can we hope to prevent others from occurring in our lifetime.

More Info: en.wikipedia.org