Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum is going virtual today (January 27) to pay tribute to the millions of people who unlawfully lost their life through the Holocaust.
January 27 marks the 76th anniversary since the liberation of prisoners at Auschwitz, were more than one million people devastatingly died. We now know this day to be Holocaust Remembrance Day, in which museums, institutions and individuals from around the world remember those who harrowingly suffered through Nazi persecution.
Usually, the sobering visitor experience holds the commemoration on the site where the concentration and extermination camp once stood. However, due to the continued impacts of the COVID 19 pandemic, officials at Auschwitz have reimagined the tributes, and will now be held entirely online.
Taking place at 16:00 CET (15:00 BST). Little has been revealed about the programme of contents, however Dr. Piotr M. A. Cywiński, Director of Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum has said this annual memorial will focus on the children of the Holocaust.
He added: “Over 200,000 children were murdered in Auschwitz. Completely innocent, good, curious about life, loving their closest ones, trusting children. The adult world – after all, so often unjust and cruel – has never demonstrated so much of its heartlessness, its evil.
“This cannot be justified by any ideology, reckoning or politics. This year we want to dedicate the anniversary of liberation to the youngest victims of the camp.”
Auschwitz now stands at the heart of Holocaust Memorial Day, on a day the world will continue to remember the 11 million innocent individuals lost and others caught up in the cruelties of Nazi persecution.
The English version of the commemorations can be watched here
