The genocide that still haunts Russian-Ukrainian relations

Russia once tried to kill millions of Ukrainians. The nation hasn't forgotten.

A victim lies in a lay cart in Ukraine, 1934.
(Image credit: Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

Russian President Vladimir Putin has long regretted the collapse of the Soviet Union. Unsurprisingly, that nostalgia for a lost empire isn't shared by those in Ukraine he's now trying to conquer.

In a long, rambling broadcast as the invasion was beginning last week, Putin spoke of the shared history of Russia and Ukraine and what he called the tragedy of Ukrainian independence. "From the very first steps, they began to build their statehood on the denial of everything that unites us. They tried to distort the consciousness, the historical memory of millions of people, entire generations living in Ukraine," Putin said, according to the Reuters translation.

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Jason Fields

Jason Fields is a writer, editor, podcaster, and photographer who has worked at Reuters, The New York Times, The Associated Press, and The Washington Post. He hosts the Angry Planet podcast and is the author of the historical mystery "Death in Twilight."