Viktor Yushchenko received the Gareth Jones Medal for sharing truth about the Holodomor

Ukrainian politician, public figure and the third President of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko received the “Gareth Jones Medal. Truth and Honor” for sharing truth about the Holodomor and promotion of the restoration of historical truth about the genocide.

“When we speak about one of our greatest tragedies, the Great famine of the 20s, 30s, and 40s, we must remember that the topic was completely forbidden until 1991,” Viktor Yushchenko said in his speech. “Our students didn’t even write papers or essays about it. But through a series of national conferences, slowly, step by step, we opened this topic, raised it in the status of legislation and gave ourselves the task to understand the scale of what was happening. If we properly evaluate the scale in a scientific way, we can come closer to a reply as to why this happened,” he added.

RELATED: A memorial plaque to Gareth Jones, who told the world about the Holodomor, has been opened in Kyiv

Viktor Yushchenko reflected upon the reasons of the femine:

“In 1932-1933, it was forbidden for Ukrainians to leave their national lands, and the famine affected only the ethnical lands of Ukraine. This is the exclusive approach of the Russian central government, which based its political matrix on dictatorship.”

Among other public figures who received the medal are:

• Levko Lukianenko, Ukrainian politician, Soviet dissident, one of the founders of the Ukrainian Helsinki Group, human rights activist, honorary chairman of the Association of Researchers of the Holodomor-Genocide in Ukraine (1994-2000), author of publications on the Holodomors in Ukraine (posthumously).
• Oleksandr Panchenko, journalist, researcher and the author of articles about Holodomor.
• Mykhailo Sydorzhevsky, journalist, editor-in-chief of Ukrainian Literary Newspaper, author of publications about the Holodomors tragedy in Zhytomyr region, head of the National Writer’ Union of Ukraine.

Ukrainian editions about Holodomor

The awarding ceremony took place at the Institute of Journalism of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv. The Gareth Jones Medal was awarded to Viktor Yushchenko by Volodymyr Rizun, the Director of the Institute of Journalism.

Viktor Yushchenko is the third President of Ukraine, the initiator of the commemoration of the Holodomor victims in Ukraine at the state level, the author of the book “Non State Secrets” and other publications covering the Holodomor.

The Gareth Jones Medal is an award established by the Institute of Journalism of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv in 2019 to commemorate the famous Welsh journalist Gareth Jones, who was the first to tell the world about the genocide in Ukraine in 1932-1933.

We’ve prepared a short list of books you could read to find out more about Holodomor and the times of the Soviet occupation:

Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin by Timothy Snyder
Red Famine: Stalin’s War on Ukraine by Anne Applebaum
Gareth Jones: Eyewitness to the Holodomor by Ray Gamache
The Transformation of Civil Society by William Noll

RELATED: Inclusive Ukrainian children’s book on Holodomor published in Hungary with Braille and audio edition

Image: Daryna Holovan