80 Years After Liberation Of Auschwitz-Birkenau, Global Atrocities Continue
(ANALYSIS) Monday marks the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi German concentration and extermination camp Auschwitz-Birkenau. Over 1 million people were murdered there, most of them Jews, but also Poles, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war and people of other nationalities.
Auschwitz was the biggest Nazi camp. The camp was founded in early 1940 in response to the growing number of arrests and the overcrowding of prisons and other institutions across Europe.
The first prisoners were Poles. However, in 1942, Auschwitz was turned from a concentration camp into a death camp (extermination camp) for the purposes of “Endlösung der Judenfrage” (the final solution to the Jewish question). Over the years of its existence, the camp significantly expanded to become a complex consisting of three parts: Auschwitz I, Auschwitz II-Birkenau and Auschwitz III-Monowitz. Ultimately, over a million people lost their lives in the Auschwitz-Birkenau complex before Soviet troops liberated the few survivors on Jan. 27, 1945.
In 2005, the U.N. General Assembly designated Jan. 27 as the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust to use the memory to educate and prevent. The resolution establishing the day urged member states to “develop educational programs that will inculcate future generations with the lessons of the Holocaust in order to help to prevent future acts of genocide.”
The resolution further condemned all manifestations of “religious intolerance, incitement, harassment or violence against persons or communities based on ethnic origin or religious belief, wherever they occur,” among others.
This year’s theme for the commemoration is “Holocaust Remembrance and Education for Dignity and Human Rights.” As emphasized by the U.N., the theme reflects “the critical relevance of Holocaust remembrance for the present, where the dignity and human rights of our fellow global citizens are under daily attack. The Holocaust shows what happens when hatred, dehumanization and apathy win.”
The horrific atrocities of the war and the Holocaust shocked the conscience of humanity and resulted in the establishment of the United Nations, steps towards justice and accountability including at Nuremberg, and the codification of genocide and solidifying the duties to prevent and punish the crime (in the U.N. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide), among others.
The Auschwitz –Birkenau concentration and extermination camp. (Photo courtesy Catholic Church of England and Wales)
Despite important steps taken in the years following the Holocaust, many of the promises to prevent and punish the crime of genocide (and other atrocity crimes) are unaddressed to this day.
To this day, only a few countries have introduced mechanisms that enable them to monitor early warning signs and risk factors to identify situations at risk of atrocity crimes.
To this day, only a few countries have adopted comprehensive atrocity prevention strategies to guide their responses.
To this day, such atrocity crimes as genocide are being perpetrated before our eyes with the international community always doing too little and too late in response.
To this day, only a few perpetrators are brought to account with the raging impunity sending the unimaginable message that one can get away with genocide.
Commemorating the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau cannot stop at words — and must include comprehensive actions to implement the promises made after the Holocaust and after every genocide perpetrated ever since.
This includes ensuring that countries take ownership of their responses to atrocity crimes, including their prevention. An example to follow could the Elie Wiesel Genocide and Atrocities Prevention Act of 2018, an act which, among other things, prioritizes the prevention of genocide and other mass atrocities as a matter of national security interest and ensures that foreign service officers receive adequate training in conflict and atrocity prevention.
It further ensures regular reporting on atrocity crimes in focus and the responses thereto. Turning words into actions also includes ensuring that genocide and other atrocity crimes are criminalized, local authorities are trained in investigating such crimes and leaving no space for impunity to flourish. Until then, “never again” will remain an empty promise.
This piece was republished from Forbes with permission.
Dr. Ewelina U. Ochab is a human rights advocate, author and co-founder of the Coalition for Genocide Response. She’s authored the book “Never Again: Legal Responses to a Broken Promise in the Middle East” and more than 30 UN reports. She works on the topic of genocide and persecution of ethnic and religious minorities around the world. She is on X @EwelinaUO.