Auschwitz; 60 years later

Maëlle · Jan 27, 2005

BRZEZINKA, Poland -- World leaders have joined elderly Holocaust survivors in Poland to mark the 60th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi death camp Auschwitz.

Thursday's ceremony at the site of the main death factory at Birkenau started with the mournful whistle of an imaginary train on the tracks that brought more than a million deportees to their deaths.

Candles flickered atop the track leading into the vast, snow-covered camp amid a steady snowfall and sub-freezing temperatures.

Elderly survivors, many accompanied by younger relatives, attended the ceremony between the rusting barbed-wire fences, facing a monument to the victims.

"I am not here to talk about what happened. My only aim is to light a candle for my mother, whose ashes are who knows where in this camp," said Jan Wojciech Topolewski, a former prisoner whose mother died in Auschwitz.

Girl Scouts brought blankets and coffee to the survivors sitting in the freezing weather.

"Today I'm remembering my father, gassed here. I'm remembering the atrocious things they did to us here," said Franciszek Jozefiak, 80.

"I drank water from a dirty pool and, to punish me, an SS man jumped on my arm and broke it and jumped on my chest and broke two ribs."

Russian President Vladimir Putin told the gathering the world must remember the Auschwitz tragedy in the current fight against international terrorists.

"Terrorism is as dangerous as Nazism, killing innocent people," Putin said. "Just as there cannot be any good or bad facists, can't be any good or bad terrorists."

French President Jacques Chirac, the first leader of his country to acknowledge French complicity in the Holocaust, said the European Union would stand united to counter anti-Semitism, Reuters reported.

Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, a survivor who later became Poland's foreign minister, said: "For a former inmate of Auschwitz, it is an unimaginable and overwhelming emotion to be able to speak in this cemetery without graves, the largest one in the history of Europe."

"I never imagined I would outlive Hitler or survive World War II."

Israeli President Moshe Katsav said: "It seems if you listen hard enough, you can still hear the outcry of horror of the murdered people. ... When I walk the ground of the concentration camps, I fear that I am walking on the ashes of the victims."

Among the other world leaders at the ceremony are Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski, U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, German President Horst Kohler, Britain's Prince Edward, Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands and Belgium's King Albert.

Vatican representatives read a message from Pope John Paul II.

The leaders placed candles at the monument to the victims of Auschwitz as they left.

Before the ceremony, survivors and officials met in nearby Krakow for a Holocaust forum, where they heard from one of the Soviet liberators.

"I would like to say to all the people on the earth: This should never be repeated, ever," said Maj. Anatoly Shapiro, 92, who commanded the first troops who entered Auschwitz.

"I saw the faces of the people we liberated -- they went through hell," he said in a recorded video greeting from New York, where he lives. Shapiro was too ill to travel to the commemoration.

The forum at Krakow's Slovacki theater opened with applause for Shapiro and three other Soviet army veterans who helped liberate Auschwitz on January 27, 1945.

Kwasniewski awarded one of the veterans, Yakov Vinnichenko, the Polish Officer's Cross. Two others, Genri Koptev-Gomolov and Nikolai Chertkov, were awarded the Cavalry Cross of the Polish Republic, The Associated Press reported.

"These commemorations are intended to promote knowledge of Auschwitz as widely as possible and bring the truth about the camps to the younger generation," Kwasniewski told Polish state radio, Reuters reported.

Putin acknowledged to the morning gathering that anti-Semitism and xenophobia had surfaced in his country.

Tackling an issue the Kremlin has been accused of failing to confront directly, Putin said many in the world should be ashamed of new manifestations of anti-Semitism six decades after the defeat of fascism, AP reported.

"Even in our country, in Russia, which did more than any to combat fascism, for the victory of fascism, which did most to save the Jewish people, even in our country we sometimes unfortunately see manifestations of this problem and I, too, am ashamed of that," Putin said to long applause.

Cheney told the gathering that the Holocaust did not happen in some far-off place but "in the heart of the civilized world."

"The story of the camps shows that evil is real and must be called by its name and must be confronted," he said.

"We are reminded that anti-Semitism may begin with words but rarely stops with words and the message of intolerance and hatred must be opposed before it turns into acts of horror."

Ukraine's newly elected president, Viktor Yushchenko, was greeted with a standing ovation when he entered the hall.

He said he brought his children to the event and spoke of his father, a wounded Soviet prisoner of war who survived Auschwitz.

"This is a sacred place for me and my family," Yushchenko said. "This is a place where Andrei Yushchenko, my father, suffered. There will never be a Jewish question in my country, I vow that."

'Never again'
In Brussels, members of the European Parliament stood in a minute of silence to pay tribute to the victims of the Holocaust and to mark the anniversary.

"Everyone is surprised such a thing happened, but it did," said EU Parliament President Josep Borrell. "It's difficult to pay just memory to it. It is a battle against the weakness of memory, something which should never happen again."

The EU assembly then passed a resolution by 617 votes to 0, with 10 abstentions, condemning anti-Semitism and racism and paying homage to the victims of Nazi Germany, AP reported.

And in Germany, a Holocaust survivor warned his countrymen to be vigilant against anti-Semitism, particularly in the Muslim world. Arno Lustiger told German leaders gathered in parliament for the national Holocaust Remembrance Day that everyone must fight anti-Semitism, AP reported.

"The hate toward Israel and its people, the denial of the right to life of the Jewish state by the Arab-Muslim world, the violence against Jews and their institutions fills me with pain and anger," Lustiger said.

"Anti-Semitism and particularly its Islamic stamp should not just be the concern of the Jews because forces are working in Europe that want to bomb our civilization back into the Middle Ages," he said.

Parliament president Wolfgang Thierse called on Germans to fight continued anti-Semitism in Germany, especially in light of the regional resurgence of the far-right National Democratic Party -- which took nearly 10 percent of the vote in elections in the eastern state of Saxony last year.

'Death march'
Birkenau -- the largest of the camps at Auschwitz -- is where Nazi doctors decided which deportees would be sent to forced labor and which would be condemned to immediate death in the gas chambers.

An estimated 1.1 million to 1.5 million people, most of the Jews, were killed in the gas chambers or died of disease, starvation, abuse and exhaustion at Auschwitz.

When Soviet troops reached the camp 60 years ago, they found some 7,000 survivors, many barely alive.

The retreating Nazis had destroyed the gas chambers and crematoria and many of the barracks, and forced most of the remaining prisoners into the snow on a "death march" to camps further west.

Auschwitz is the most notorious of the death camps set up by Adolf Hitler to carry out his "final solution," the murder of Europe's Jewish population.

Six million Jews died in the Nazi camps, along with several million others, including Soviet prisoners of war, Gypsies, homosexuals and political opponents of the Nazis.

CNN's Chris Burns contributed to this report from Auschwitz.
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Cassie · Jan 27, 2005

*stabs genocide*

May their bodies rest in peace, forevermore.

adelleda · Jan 27, 2005

We were talking about this in class and watched a video about it. It's really truely sad

Friskey™ · Jan 27, 2005

I saw something on it on Channel One (news program that schools run) this morning...very powerful stuff!

Alacrity · Jan 27, 2005

What happened was absolutely horrible, and will never be forgiven or forgotten. May the deceased rest in peace, and I hope the survivors are living long lives if they're still around today. They are truely some of the strongest people on the earth, in my opinion.

lp_sk8ergurl · Jan 27, 2005

R.I.P

Glenn · Jan 29, 2005

Rest in peace all who died in the camps and I wish the best for the survivors. This is one of the most depressing memories in recent history- the attempt to kill everyone except a "master race"

Perla · Feb 10, 2005

I hate Nazi's. My family was also in a camp called Jasenovac in Croatia, they weren't Jews, but they were orthodox and Nazi's hated slavic ppl, especially orthodox Serbians... My friends grandmother was saved by Schindler (u know who he is if you've watched the movie Schindler's list). The gestapo wanted to find out where my mothers uncle (who was a very important man back then) was hiding, so they came one night to my gran's house and smashed some glass and put it in Ricinus oil (i think that's how it's called, anyhow it works like laksativ). My granny had to drink that if she didn't want to tell them. So all that glass went down here stomach, causing a lot of internal bleeding. Bastards!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :angry: :angry: :angry: :angry: :angry: I HATE THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My story is just one of many awful stories... I do not wish sympathy, i just wanted u to see, what kind of shit walks this Earth! :angry: Glad it's over now.

the_king_of_all · Feb 14, 2005

what happened there was EXTREMELY sickening, i REALLY seriously hope no-one EVER has to experience that again. genocide is one of the stupidist things ever. especialy as the nazi's were executing people who hadn't done anything, they just needed somewhere to point the blame for their mistakes, it is truly depressing. R.I.P

lofton0788 · Feb 14, 2005

That sucks what those stupid nazi's did...
That one of the reasons I like system of a down because they are very much anti-genocide, though not with the jews but instead the armenian genocide

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Auschwitz; 60 years later

Maëlle I've seen it all

Cassie The time to hesitate is through.

adelleda Well-Known Member

Friskey™ LPA Super Member LPA Addict

Alacrity don't stop talking to me; i haven't been listening LPA Super Member

lp_sk8ergurl Well-Known Member

Glenn Super Member LPA Super Member

Perla Give 'Em Hell Kid

the_king_of_all LPA Super Member LPA Super Member

lofton0788 Well-Known Member

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Auschwitz; 60 years later

Maëlle I've seen it all

Cassie The time to hesitate is through.

adelleda Well-Known Member

Friskey™ LPA Super Member LPA Addict

Alacrity don't stop talking to me; i haven't been listening LPA Super Member

lp_sk8ergurl Well-Known Member

Glenn Super Member LPA Super Member

Perla Give 'Em Hell Kid

the_king_of_all LPA Super Member LPA Super Member

lofton0788 Well-Known Member

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