01/26/2020 16:38
(Act. 26.01.2020 16:40)
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Last week, Van der Bellen commemorated Nazi victims in Israel
© APA (AFP)
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On the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Nazi German extermination camp Auschwitz by the Red Army, the Polish President Andrzej Duda invited numerous heads of state and government. For the commemoration on Monday afternoon, representatives from around 50 countries, including Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen and Israel’s head of state Reuven Rivlin, are on the guest list.
Around 120 Auschwitz survivors are also expected to attend the ceremony, some of whom will give a speech. As with the commemoration at the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Israel last Thursday, German Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Spanish King Felipe VI resigned. and the Dutch king Willem-Alexander.
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The four allies of World War II, on the other hand, send different representatives to Poland than to Israel: For the United States, Finance Minister Steven Mnuchin takes the place of Vice President Mike Pence, for France Prime Minister Édouard Philippe instead of President Emmanuel Macron and for Great Britain the wife of Prince Charles, Duchess Camilla the heir to the throne himself. Russian President Vladimir Putin also stayed away from the commemorative act in Poland, and he was represented by Ambassador Sergei Andreev.
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The already bad relations between Warsaw and Moscow have recently been further dampened. Putin had accused government officials of pre-war Poland of anti-Semitism and a penchant for Nazi Germany. There has also recently been a controversy between Poland and Israel over whether Poles collaborated with the Nazi occupiers during the Second World War. Poland’s President Duda did not attend the memorial service in Yad Vashem in protest that he was not allowed to deliver a speech like Putin.
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Van der Bellen is accompanied to Poland by his wife Doris Schmidauer, EU Minister Karoline Edtstadler, IKG President Oskar Deutsch and Auschwitz survivor Viktor Klein. It is the Federal President’s first visit to Auschwitz. At the international Holocaust commemoration in Israel a few days earlier, he had reminded that Austria had “shared responsibility for the Shoah”. “We will only live up to the memory of the victims of the Shoah if we ensure that contempt for human beings, scapegoats and violence are never used again as a political instrument,” Van der Bellen warned.
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In Austria, on Monday evening in the Vienna stock exchange halls, the parliament commemorated the liberation of the Auschwitz Nazi extermination camp in 1945. One day before the International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the ÖVP, SPÖ and Greens reminded people of social responsibility and urged vigilance. Anti-Semitism and hatred and agitation should not be allowed in society. The FPÖ also condemned the crimes of National Socialism.
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Vice Chancellor Werner Kogler (Greens) called for a consistent stand against hatred and agitation and for tolerance. Too many so-called “isolated cases” have repeatedly shown that anti-Semitism, hatred and agitation break out again and again. This must be combated at all levels, says Kogler: “Reminding alone is not enough.” The fight against anti-Semitism was “of the highest priority” for turquoise green.
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For ÖVP Minister of Education Heinz Faßmann, an active reminder policy must be an integral part of school education. In addition to data and facts, it is “just as important” that the personal stories are told, says Faßmann: “Our Institute for Holocaust Education does a valuable and indispensable job.” The Minister of Education also recalled that the turquoise-green coalition is committed to continuing an active memory policy in the field of education.
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“It is our task to remember these incredible murderous crimes in the darkest chapter of our history and to learn the right lessons from them,” said SPÖ federal party chairwoman Pamela Rendi-Wagner. The commemoration day calls for vigilance towards all authoritarian, anti-democratic, racist and anti-Semitic tendencies, according to the SPÖ leader: “Brutalization, hatred and violence must not have a place in our society.” Poverty, unemployment and a lack of prospects are often a “breeding ground” for this, which is why social democracy is fighting against it.
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He warned FPÖ club chairman Herbert Kickl against an increase in anti-Semitism by Islamists and the left. “The terrible and unique crimes that have been committed in the name of the inhuman sentiment of National Socialism in the last century must always be kept in mind. They are an eternal mandate for vigilance,” said Kickl. However, the FPÖ politician attributed the fact that anti-Semitism is getting stronger again to Islamists and the left. While “Islamist fanatics” agitate against Jews and demand the annihilation of Israel, leftists would “also act against Israel and against Jews under the guise of an alleged ‘anti-Zionism’.”
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