President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked France on March 28 for recognizing the Holodomor as a genocide against the Ukrainian people.
One hundred and sixty-eight deputies of the National Assembly, the lower house of the French parliament, voted in favor of the resolution. Two voted against it.
The Holodomor, a man-made famine that took place between 1932-33, occurred during Joseph Stalin's reign over the Soviet Union and caused an estimated 3.5 to 5 million Ukrainian deaths.
The Ukrainian government has been calling on the international community to recognize it as a genocide.
President Zelensky called the vote "important and significant", adding that he was "grateful for France's strong contribution to exposing totalitarian Russia's past and present crimes, establishing truth, justice, and hence accountability."
Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said that, "With this historic vote, the National Assembly made it clear that such crimes will never be forgotten and must never be repeated."
France joined Iceland, which recognized the Holodomor as a genocide on March 23, and Belgium, which did so on March 10.
The Czech Republic, Germany, Romania, Ireland, Bulgaria, and a number of other countries also did so in 2022 and 2023.
In December 2022, the European Parliament also officially recognized the Holodomor as a genocide and urged Russia to issue an official apology for the atrocities committed by the Soviet regime.
Iryna Matviyishyn
