WHEREAS, 2021 marks the 88th anniversary of the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-1933, known as Holodomor, meaning "Murder by Starvation"; and
WHEREAS, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin and his totalitarian regime committed an act of genocide through the implementation of an engineered famine by confiscating land, grain and animals from the Ukrainian people, resulting in the deaths of millions of innocent men, women, and children; and
WHEREAS, Holodomor was specifically designed by the Soviet regime to punish independent-minded Ukrainians for their resistance to its economic, political, and social oppression; and
WHEREAS, at the height of the Holodomor in 1933, it is estimated that Ukrainians died at a rate of 28,000 a day with nearly a third of its victims being children less than 10 years old; and
WHEREAS, even as the Soviets continued to export Ukraine's grain to the rest of the world, Ukrainian farmers, who tended to the farms in the "bread basket of the U.S.S.R", were tragically starved to a slow and painful death; and
WHEREAS, with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, archival documents created during this time surfaced that detail the Soviet regime's actions and intention to destroy Ukraine's national identity by deporting and executing Ukraine's religious, intellectual, and cultural leaders, prosecuting or executing those who spoke of the famine or against the Soviet authorities publicly, further destabilizing Ukraine's political structure; and
WHEREAS, under the global theme Ukraine Remembers, the World Acknowledges, it is necessary that Holodomor be officially recognized by the global community as a tragic and heinous crime against humanity in order to prevent similar tragedies from occurring in the future; and
WHEREAS, the State of North Carolina encourages individuals, groups, organizations, and institutions to remember Holodomor with appropriate activities designed to honor its victims and educate people about the history and crimes of totalitarian regimes to help eliminate tyranny from our world;
NOW, THEREFORE, I, ROY COOPER, Governor of the State of North Carolina, do hereby proclaim November 28, 2021, as “HOLODOMOR REMEMBRANCE DAY” in North Carolina, and commend its observance to all citizens.