An article last March 31, 1933, titled “Russians Hungry, But Not Starving,” by Walter Duranty of the New York Times, implied that reports of a famine in the Ukraine engineered by the Soviet government were political fabrications arising from a diplomatic dispute between Great Britain and the Stalin regime.  The article stated:

In the middle of the diplomatic duel between Great Britain and the Soviet Union over the accused British engineers, there appears from a British source a big scare story in the American press about famine in the Soviet Union, with ‘thousands already dead and millions menaced by death from starvation.

and went on to imply that stories of man-made famine and genocide in the Ukraine were exaggerations or false.

Since the publication of “Russians Hungry, But Not Starving,” several readers have written to complain about the accuracy of the article.  After careful review, we conclude that in certain respects, the article appears to have been in error, in that it now appears that an engineered famine did take place in the Ukraine.  We further note that some Ukrainians do refer to this event as a “genocide.”

However, we reject any implication that follow-up reporting from the Times on the controversy surrounding this issue should refer to previous Times reports which cast allegations of genocide into doubt, or that the Times should make some gesture of apology, such as disavowing the Pulitzer Prize awarded to Duranty for excellence in reporting on the Soviet Union.

Nevertheless, we regret the error.

A Caravaggio was lost.

A painting by the great Italian artist Caravaggio was stolen from the Odessa Museum of Western and Eastern Art, according to an announcement on Thursday from the informational website Odessa.

“Between 6:00 pm on July 29 and 10.00 am July 31, an unknown person entered the Odessa Museum of Western and Eastern Art through broken windows, who stole the painting of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, “The Taking of Christ,” or “Judas’s Kiss,” according to the report.

On Thursday the museum was closed for cleaning day, according to investigators.

“The Taking of Christ” was created in the early 17th century. The painting was purchased in Paris, by the Russian Ambassador to France. In 1870, he presented the picture to the Grand Duke Vladimir [the Tsar's brother]. The canvas was kept in the Odessa museum in the 20th century, In 2006 the painting was restored to its original condition by specialists in Kiev.

Jesus wept!

Well, this and because I’d hate to see a comment from you, one of our valued readers, go down into the tubes.

I have removed all hyperlinks from the following, because some of them would be bad for your computer.

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