For the first time, the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute has organized a Holocaust Remembrance Week dedicated to the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp and the end of World War II.

Today the first meeting took place at the AGMI Conference Hall.

The opening speech was delivered by the AGMI Director Harutyun Marutyan, who stressed:

“On January 24, we attended the event near the Monument to the Holocaust and Genocide Victims, where we paid tribute to the memory of the Holocaust victims. In the near future we will try to organize also temporary exhibitions during those commemoration weeks”.

Harutyun Marutyan also read the welcome speech of the RA President Armen Sargsyan addressed to the organizers and participants of the event:

“We, the Armenians and the Jews, have a historical mission and responsibility - to perpetuate the memory of the greatest crimes committed against humanity - the memory of victims of the Armenian Genocide and Holocaust, and to always keep the memory alive in humanity as a lesson, as a reminder, as prevention.

Neither the tragedy of Auschwitz-Birkenau nor the heroism of those liberators should disappear from our memory.

I welcome this initiative of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute and wish success for the Holocaust Remembrance Week.”

Then, speeches were delivered by the head of the AGMI Vahagn Dadrian Department of Comparative Genocide Studies, Dr. Suren Manukyan “About the concept of the day,” head of the Jewish community in Armenia Rima Varjapetyan-Filler - “Presentation of events held in Auschwitz, in 27 January 2020”, and Dr. Harutyun Marutyan “Structural features of the Armenian Genocide and Holocaust.”

The event was attended by the RA President's Advisor Hamlet Gasparyan, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Poland to the Republic of Armenia Pawel Cieplak, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Austria to the Republic of Armenia Alois Kraut (residence in Austria), as well as, researchers, journalists and students.

The next meeting will take place on January 31, at 11 am, at the AGMI Conference Hall. The speaker of the day will be Professor Ashot Hayruni, YSU Faculty of History, Chair of Armenian History. His presentation will be on “Preparation and execution of the mass extermination of the Jews by the Hitler regime”.