We must never forget Holocaust – Shatter

Justice Minister Alan Shatter has warned that the world must never be allowed to forget the horror of the Nazi Holocaust.

Launching a new exhibition in Dublin on the systematic extermination of an estimated six million European Jews this week, Mr Shatter said: ‘As the years pass by and the remaining survivors of the Nazi horror who can tell the story firsthand reduce in number, it becomes more important than ever that we keep alive the shocking memory of the Holocaust.

‘It is crucial that we never forget what happened or diminish the scale of the horror that was perpetrated by the Nazi regime.’

The minister said the exhibition ‘is an important contribution to raising awareness of the Holocaust’.

The exhibition provides a global view of the Holocaust in Europe, starting with the growth of the Nazi movement, through the different stages of the persecution, inhumane treatment and extermination of millions of Jews, up to the Nuremburg Trials.

It also gives a picture of both the political and military reactions of a number of states to this, which, Mr Shatter said, ‘included disinterest of some nations toward the fate of the Jews’ and looks at reactions at an individual level including Jewish resistance and the Righteous among Nations.

The Holocaust Education Trust Ireland (HETI) has worked with Memorial de la Shoah in Paris and the Embassy of France to Ireland to bring the exhibit to Dublin. It runs every day at the Department of Justice, 51 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2.