Auschwitz not only a museum, but also a ‘warning’: Polish president

“What might happen if international law is violated, and the international community does not react in time? What could happen if some states behave aggressively towards others, if they invade their territories; if they wage war and hatred? Therefore, Auschwitz is, and will always be a great warning,” President Andrzej Duda said during a commemoration ceremony on Wednesday.

Duda started his speech by thanking the survivors of the WWII-era camp who had travelled to the site. “You are witnesses to that story”, Duda said, adding that the camp saw “unimaginable loss suffered by the Jewish and Polish nations, among others”.

“[People were] ruthlessly murdered. A few were chosen only so that they could be directed to murderous work, the rest were killed immediately. Fathers looked on as their wives and children were led to the gas chambers. It's unimaginable. And it was not conceivable, because the truth is so horrible that initially no one wanted to believe it,” the president said.

Over 1.1 million people, mostly European Jews, as well as non-Jewish Poles, Roma and Sinti, Soviet POWs and people of many other nationalities, perished at Auschwitz at the hands of Poland’s Nazi German occupiers during World War II.

In 2005, the United Nations designated 27 January as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Although the Auschwitz camp was located in southern Poland, it was run by German Nazis, who occupied Poland in WWII.

The use of the term "Polish concentration camp” by international media outlets has inspired numerous complaints from Poland in recent years, prompting some news agencies to change their style guidelines.

In 2007, following a Polish request, the World Heritage Committee attempted to clarify the matter by listing the Auschwitz camp as a "German Nazi Concentration and Extermination Camp”. (rg/pk)

Holocaust survivors at the commemoration ceremony on Wednesday. Photo: PAP/Andrzej Grygiel