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Friendship and remembrance

Wed, 27.01.2010
President Shimon Peres in the German Bundestag
Enlargement
Photo: REGIERUNGonline/Kugler
If we are to build the future, we must not forget the past.
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Remembrance in the German Bundestag

With the Israeli President Shimon Peres, the German  Bundestag remembered the victims of National Socialism on International Holocaust Remembrance Day. President Peres stressed the importance of the "unique" German-Israeli friendship. Together we are called on to keep alive the memory of the Shoa, while looking to the future, he said.
"Germany will always bear the responsibility for this part of history," Chancellor Angela Merkel told Holocaust survivors and young Germans the day before the commemorations. Only on this basis can we move on and shape the future together.
 
Shimon Peres too declared that if we want to build a new future, we must not forget the past. He was the first Israeli President to address the German Bundestag on the Holocaust Remembrance Day.
 
President Shimon Peres wearing a kippa at the lecternPhoto: REGIERUNGonline/Kugler Enlargement President Shimon Peres
 
65 years ago, on 27 January 1945, the Soviet Red Army liberated the German concentration camp at Auschwitz west of Krakow. Since 1996 this day, 27 January, has been a national day of remembrance for the victims of National Socialism. The initiative was the idea of the then Federal President Roman Herzog, who declared, "Remembrance must not come to an end. It must also call future generations to be alert.” This day of remembrance commemorates all victims of the Nazi regime. Every year a remembrance ceremony is held in the German Bundestag.

In 2005 the United Nations declared the 27 January International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
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