FOR THE RECORD: UCC statement on Darfur (05/21/06)

FOR THE RECORD

UCC statement on Darfur

Following is the text of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress' statement on the crisis in the Darfur region of Sudan. It was sent to The Weekly by the UCC national headquarters on May 15.

In recent months, the world has been increasingly shocked by the ongoing genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan. There, mainly Arab militias known as the Janjaweed are being used by the Sudanese government to ethnically cleanse the region of the local non-Arab population.

The scale of the tragedy evolving there is terrible. Recent reports estimate that more than 300,000 people have already died. Over 2 million people have been displaced from their homes and hundreds of thousands have fled to the neighboring country of Chad.

What is disturbing for Ukrainian Canadians is that food is being used as a weapon by the government. The victims face death from starvation and disease as the government of Sudan and militias attempt to prevent humanitarian aid from reaching them.

This eerily mirrors what took place in Ukraine during the Genocide-Famine of 1932-1933 when the rulers of the Soviet Union purposely took food from the Ukrainian countryside and allowed millions to die of starvation as part of their plan to destroy the Ukrainian people and eliminate the private ownership of land.

The Ukrainian Canadian Congress calls upon the people and government of Canada to add their voices to those who are calling for international action to stop the outrages in Darfur. Additionally, the UCC urges the Canadian government to take the lead in protecting the victims and alleviating their plight.

In 1932-1933 the world was silent as millions of Ukrainians were starved to death in a famine engineered by Stalin. We cannot and will not allow that to happen again to any people. Atrocities such as Darfur are no longer a secret to the rest of the world. Today, we must act collectively to stop the genocide in Darfur. It is not too late.

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