Holocaust Memorial Day latest: Survivors join world leaders at Auschwitz on 80th anniversary of Nazi death camp's liberation
Holocaust Memorial Day latest: Survivors join world leaders at Auschwitz on 80th anniversary of Nazi death camp's liberation
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Auschwitz survivors will be joined by world leaders on Monday to mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi German death camp by Soviet troops. The anniversary at the site of the camp, which Nazi Germany set up in occupied Poland during World War Two, will be attended by a host of world leaders including King Charles, French President Emmanuel Macron and European Council President Antonio Costa.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan is also set to attend the ceremony, which is taking place on Holocaust Memorial Day. The main commemoration will begin at 3pm UK time in a tent built over the gate to the former Auschwitz II-Birkenau camp. More than 1.1 million people, mostly Jews, perished in gas chambers or from starvation, cold and disease at Auschwitz.
Scroll down for the latest updates. The King will become the first British head of state to visit Auschwitz-Birkenau when he tours the former Nazi concentration camp on Monday to mark the 80th anniversary of its liberation. Charles was heading to Poland to commemorate the milestone with foreign monarchs, presidents, prime ministers and Holocaust survivors invited to a service at the Auschwitz-Birkenau museum and memorial.
More than a million people, mostly Jews but also Poles, Soviet prisoners of war and other nationalities, were murdered by the Nazis at Auschwitz-Birkenau during the Second World War as part of the Holocaust in which six million Jewish men, women and children were killed.
