Kretschmer urges vigilance at memorial service

Saxony's Minister President Michael Kretschmer (CDU) has called on people to be vigilant on the occasion of the day of remembrance for the victims of National Socialism. "We cannot undo history," he said today at the state's central commemoration ceremony in Pirna-Sonnenstein. "But by remembering and mourning together, we can keep the memory of the victims alive and be vigilant against any trivialization of dictatorship and contempt for humanity."

According to Kretschmer, the horror of the millions of murders continues. "There is no statute of limitations on this injustice," he said with a view to January 27, which is also the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz extermination camp. "The path to the extermination camps began with the contempt for sick people, with the judgment of people as worthy of life and unworthy of life." On Sonnenstein and in Großschweidnitz, too, sanatoriums were turned into places where human lives were systematically extinguished.

Wreaths for those murdered on the Sonnenstein

Kretschmer, President of the State Parliament Alexander Dierks, several ministers and representatives of the diplomatic corps, the Jewish communities and the churches honored those murdered together with some descendants with a wreath-laying ceremony at the Pirna memorial site. Between 1940 and 1941, almost 14,000 people fell victim to the Nazis' "euthanasia" crimes at the "sanatorium", which was converted into a killing center at the time.

The day of remembrance reminds us to "do everything we can to ensure that the dark chapters of history are not repeated", said Minister of Culture Conrad Clemens (CDU). Keeping the memory alive is part of historical-political education and part of learning at school. In the late afternoon, a memorial concert was planned in Pirna's St. Mary's Church, where the New Jewish Chamber Philharmonic Orchestra would perform works by persecuted and ostracized composers.

January 27, the day on which Red Army units liberated the Auschwitz extermination camp in 1945, has been a nationwide day of remembrance for the victims of National Socialism since 1996 and is also the International Day of Commemoration in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust.