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GARETH JONES' EVIDENCE OF IMPENDING SOVIET
FAMINE IN 1930
Letter to Mr. Sulzberger, Jr, New York Times, by Margaret Siriol
Colley and Nigel Colley, UK |
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-----Original Message-----
From: Margaret Siriol Colley siriol@colley.co.uk
Sent: 24 October 2003 16:26
To: publisher@nytimes.com
Subject: Gareth Jones' evidence of impending Soviet Famine in 1930
Mr. A. O. Sulzberger, Jr,
The New York Times Company
229 West 43d Street
New York, NY 10036
24th October 2003
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Gareth Jones
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Dear Mr Sulzberger,
Re: "Times Should Lose Pulitzer From 30s, Consultant to Paper Says,"
23 October 2003, The New York Times, by Jacques Steinberg
May I add weight to Prof Lubomyr Luciuk' s letter to you to gracefully
return the 'lost' Pulitzer Prize awarded to Walter Duranty in 1932. My
uncle, Gareth Jones was the 'Mr Jones' who was so vilified in the Duranty
article published in your paper on March 31st 1933. In this article
Duranty denied there was famine stating that: "There is no actual
starvation or death from starvation, but there is wide is mortality from
diseases due to malnutrition."
In my uncle's reply to your then editor, published on May 13th 1933,
Gareth Jones considered Moscow journalists to be "master of euphemism
and understatement". Gareth Jones could not have been any more
forthright by signing-off his letter: "May I in conclusion congratulate the
Soviet Foreign Office on its skill in concealing the true situation in the
U.S.S.R.? Moscow is not Russia, and the sight of well fed people there
tends to hide the real Russia".
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Gareth Jones, a first-class honours graduate of Russian and German from
Cambridge University, later acted as a foreign affairs advisor to Lloyd
George, visited the Soviet Union in 1930, 1931 and 1933 and was no
stranger to the country. Indeed unlike the reporting of Walter Duranty,
whom Gareth met four times, he was well aware as early as August 1930
of the of the terrible plight of the Ukrainians, and he wrote from Berlin to
his parents on August 26th 1930 the following letter (A scan of the
original hand-written document may be viewed at:
http://www.colley.co.uk/garethjones/soviet_articles/gareth_1930.htm):
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"Hurray! It is wonderful to be in Germany again, absolutely wonderful.
Russia is in a very bad state; rotten, no food, only bread; oppression,
injustice, misery among the workers and 90% discontented. I saw some very
bad things, which made me mad to think that people like [Bernard Shaw] go
there and come back, after having been led round by the nose and had
enough to eat, and say that Russia is a paradise. In the South there is
talk of a new revolution, but it will never come off, because the Army and
the O.G.P.U. (Soviet Police) are too strong.
"The winter is going to be one of great suffering there and there is
starvation. The government is the most brutal in the world. The peasants
hate the Communists. This year thousands and thousands of the best men
in Russia have been sent to Siberia and the prison island of Solovki. People
are now speaking openly against the Government. In the Donetz Basin
conditions are unbearable.
"One reason why I left Hughesovska [Donetsk today] so quickly was that all
I could get to eat was a roll of bread -and that is all I had up to 7
o'clock. Many Russians are too weak to work. I am terribly sorry for them.
They cannot strike or they are shot or sent to Siberia. There are heaps of
enemies of the Communist within the country.
"Nevertheless great strides have been made in many industries and there is
a good chance that when the Five-Year Plan is over Russia may become
prosperous. But before that there will be great suffering, many riots and
many deaths."
In view of the fact that Walter Duranty must have known the true state of
affairs in Ukraine in 1930 and by his denial of the famine as 'Stalin's
Apologist', then I totally support the campaign requesting you to return
his Pulitzer in the name of my uncle, Gareth Jones and all those who sadly
perished in the Holodomor of 1932-1933.
Yours sincerely,
Margaret Siriol Colley
Dr Margaret Siriol Colley, M.B., Ch. B., D.R.C.O.G.
Nigel Colley, B.Sc.
3, Manor Court, Bramcote, Notts, NG9 3DR, U.K.
+44 -115 - 922 - 7351
P.S. There is an extensive website dedicated to Gareth Jones who was
tragically murdered in 1935, by politically-controlled bandits in Inner
Mongolia whilst 'In Search Of News' and you may be interested in discover
further details of his truthful Soviet reporting at
www.colley.co.uk/garethjones.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BY
LUBOMYR LUCIUK, UKRAINIAN CANADIAN CIVIL
LIBERTIES ASSOCIATION, Toronto, Ontario, Canada,
Thursday, October 23, 2003
Dear Editor:
re: "Times Should Lose Pulitzer From 30's, Consultant to Paper Says," 23
October 2003, The New York Times, by Jacques Steinberg
The international campaign to have Walter Duranty's Pulitzer Prize either
revoked or returned was initiated by the Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties
Association. Our initiative has never been aimed at "airbrushing" Mr Duranty
out of history. On the contrary, we insist on remembering him for what he
truly was, Stalin's apologist and a shill who helped cover up the genocidal
Great Famine of 1932-1933 in Ukraine. We just don't want Duranty to be
distinguished with a Pulitzer Prize for having so served the Soviets. Nor
should anyone else.
Yours,
Lubomyr Luciuk, PhD, Director of Research
Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Association
Suite 277, 3044 Bloor Street West
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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