Pope Prays For Victims Of Ukraine Mass Famine

Pope acknowledged those who died and said he hoped nations would now move towards reconciliation, peace and mutual respect.

Pope Benedict on Sunday prayed for the millions who perished in Ukraine's mass famine of the 1930s engineered by Josef Stalin and said he hoped human rights could no longer be denied in the name of ideology. Ukraine marked the 75th anniversary of the 1932-33 famine at a Saturday ceremony that was boycotted by Russia, which rejects Ukraine's description of the famine as a "genocide" and argues many ethnic groups in the Soviet Union were affected.

The Pope, in his Sunday morning address to the faithful, acknowledged those who died and said he hoped nations would now move towards reconciliation, peace and mutual respect.

"In the fervent hope that no political order can, in the name of an ideology, deny the rights of a human being and his freedom and dignity any more, I assure my prayers for all the innocent victims of that enormous tragedy," the Pope said.

Historians say some 7.5 million people died in the famine, aimed at breaking the spirit of Ukraine's independent farmers. Soviet authorities denied for decades that it had occurred.