Message from MsAudrey Azoulay,
Director-General of UNESCO, on the occasion of International Day of Commemoration in memory of the victims
of the Holocaust 27 January 2022
On 27 January 1945, Soviet forces entered the Nazi concentration and
extermination camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Today, we remember that terrible, dark period of history, which saw 6
million Jews murdered and which has continued to haunt the survivors and their
families - and we commemorate it unwaveringly, so that it can never be
repeated.
This work of memory has never been as relevant as it is now. Not only
because the pandemic has brought back the dark and sinister reflex of
scapegoating, but also because indecent and absurd comparisons drawn between
the measures taken to fight the pandemic and the measures taken by the Nazis to
persecute the Jews end up by downplaying the tragedy of the Holocaust.
Whenever this history is questioned, whenever violence is done to the
memory of the victims, the rise of antisemitism and hate speech is encouraged,
an everyday scourge of Jewish communities around the world.
More than ever, we must therefore be vigilant. It is our shared
responsibility to protect the truth, and to keep alive the memory of all those
who suffered under the Nazi regime; to support research and documentation that
can confront the fantasies of fanatics with the reality of history; and to
study and teach the Holocaust, so that education may prevent antisemitism and
all forms of racism.
So it is through our collective efforts, constantly renewed, that we
will be able to raise the memory of this painful past in the minds of men and
women, especially the new generations, as a bulwark against hate speech and extremist
ideologies, as a defence of peace.
That is UNESCO’s undertaking. That is why, on
this international day, I call on all our Member States to continue their
efforts alongside us to support research and education, and to raise awareness
of the horror of the Holocaust - to honour the dead, and to protect the living.
