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Auschwitz survivors to mark the anniversary of their liberation

The children in this photo have been identified and invited to International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Jan. 27, marking the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.More than 100 Auschwitz survivors from at least 17 countries will travel to Poland to participate in the observance of the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Jan. 27, 2015.

The official event is organized by the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum and the International Auschwitz Council.

The World Jewish Congress and the USC Shoah Foundation’s Institute for Visual History and Education will be among the organizations supporting this event.

Poland’s President Bronislaw Komorowski will preside over the main commemoration in front of the Death Gate at Birkenau.

Countries from around the world will be sending official delegations, including Auschwitz survivors.

“This anniversary is crucial because it may be the last major one marked by survivors,” said Ronald S. Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress.

“We are truly honored that so many of them, despite their age, have agreed to make this trip.

“Few moments in the drama that was WW II are more etched in our collective memory then the day Red Army troops came upon perhaps the greatest evil of our time,” he said.

“We have to say it clearly: It is the last big anniversary that we can commemorate with a significant group of survivors,” said Dr. Piotr MA Cywinski, director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum.

“Until now, they are the ones who taught us how to look at the tragedy of the victims of the Third Reich and the total destruction of the world of European Jews.

“Their voices became the most important warning against the human capacity for extreme humiliation, contempt and genocide.”

“On this special day we want to show the survivors and the whole world that we, the post-war generation, have matured to our own responsibility for remembrance,” said Marek Zajac, secretary of the International Auschwitz Council.

Lauder praised the efforts to preserve the site where at least 1.1 million people, most of them Jews, were murdered within less than five years.

“Twenty-five years ago, when I saw the stunning truth of Auschwitz for the first time, every part of the former camp was disintegrating,” he said. “Now, after a monumental effort, it has been preserved for future generations, and that is important in an age of Holocaust deniers.”

Twenty years ago, Lauder, along with Kalman Sultanik and Ernest Michel, raised $40 million from 19 countries in order to ensure that what remained in Auschwitz-Birkenau be forever preserved and bear witness for future generations.

Lauder also financed the creation of the conservation laboratory at the Auschwitz Memorial, which preserves every shoe, every document and every building that remained at the site.

With the help of archivists from the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, USC Shoah Foundation has identified the children from the historic photo (above) taken by Red Army photographer Alexander Vorontsov who in 1945 documented the liberation of the death camp.

The surviving children are now between the ages of 81 and 86 and have been also invited to participate in the official commemoration.

“Faced as we are with the loss of living witnesses,” said Stephen Smith, USC Shoah Foundation executive director, “it is imperative we honor them and take their stories with us into the future, so those who come after us will have no excuse to let such atrocities happen again.

“Survivors speak not only for themselves, but for the millions whose voices were violently silenced.”




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