Congressman HERTEL: As an assumption could we say that, without a number, a
lot of people in the Ukraine do know about the famine and very few people outside of
the Ukraine know about the famine? ,

Dr. STROKATA (through interpreter): When one generation succeeds another, it s a normal process to have the young forget what happened many years ago. But an in¬credible number of the young know about the hunger because this is a painful theme. Particularly because there’s an ongoing problem with food, the old people constantly remember the difficulties that existed in ‘32 and ‘33, and they compare the situations.

Then in 1964, after Khrushchev, suddenly the food vanished. I heard from young doctors who came from the village, who declared that indeed they were preparing another ‘32, and I was amazed that they, so young, knew about the famine. Probably because to this day the Ukrainian villages have not forgotten the famine of ‘32.

But in addition to this, there do exist people who in their 40s and 50s know nothing about the famine and these are people who belong to families of individuals who con¬tributed in the creation of this hunger. And obviously, their parents did not tell them about this. And those people who did contribute to the creation of the hunger, fled from the villages after the hunger was over. Many of these people were called Twenty-Five Thousanders. These were the 25,000 non-Ukrainians that Moscow sent to the vil¬lages in order to confiscate the grain. They and their children contributed to trying to pass over the famine and say that it never existed.

Congressman HERTEL: Part of our job, our major effort, of course, is to remind the world and therefore not let those people who did that escape their guilt. That’s why we’re going ahead with the Commission.

We thank you very much for coming. We thank you and your husband for all of your work on behalf of freedom. I turn the meeting over to the Chairman, Mr. Mica. Congressman
MICA: Thank you, Mr. Hertel. Do any other Commission members have questions?

Mr. MARCHISHIN: Yes. I have two questions regarding the testimony that I read. Near the beginning, Nina had indicated that she did not attend school through 1932,’33, and I’m just wondering, is this because of her age or because the schools were basi¬cally closed. I believe that we had heard that, that almost a whole school year was lost to the children. I believe that we heard that once before.

And then, a little bit later on, she mentioned that people went from apartment to apartment and I just want to clarify where these people came from. Were they from the city of Odessa, or were they from the outlying villages?

Dr. STROKATA (through interpreter): I realized as soon as I prepared my text that there would be some questions as to why I did not go to school at that time. I began with saying that I was bora in Odessa and that I lived in Odessa. Like all large cities, there was some hunger in Odessa, but it certainly did not attain tragic proportions.

There were schools in Odessa. I didn’t go to school that year for two reasons. The first being that I came down with spotted typhus, with which that boy had infected me.

And another reason, my parents belonged to that category of Ukrainians who had hopes that all of the ills which had beset Ukraine would come to an end with the destruction of the communist regime. When they saw that hunger was descending on the Ukraine, when they saw hunger approaching, they thought that this whole process