Bulgaria recognises Ukraine Soviet-era famine as 'genocide'

Bulgaria has approved a resolution declaring that the 1930s starvation of millions in Ukraine under Soviet leader Joseph Stalin was an act of "genocide".

The parliament of the EU member, where a large part of public opinion remains pro-Russian, adopted the resolution with 134 votes in favour and 26 against.

The resolution says that "any denial, justification or underestimation of this genocide flouts the memory of the millions of people who perished".

Victims of the 1932-33 Holodomor - Ukrainian for "death by starvation" - will now be commemorated in Bulgaria, Moscow's closest ally under communism, each year on the last Saturday in February.

The Bulgarian Socialist party - heir to the former communist party - boycotted the vote, while the pro-Russian party Vazrajdane voted against it.

In December, the European Parliament approved a resolution describing the Holodomor as "the artificial famine of 1932-1933 in Ukraine caused by a deliberate policy of the Soviet regime, as a genocide against the Ukrainian people".

Kiev has urged the international community to officially declare the starvation "genocide" as Ukraine confronts Moscow's modern-day aggression.