30.01.2025
“The idea of the Conference was born as follows: for several years we had held a conference of schoolchildren at the Brest Fortress, connecting the history of the Great Patriotic War with the unique history of the Brest ghetto, where questionnaires with photographs of all ghetto prisoners over 14 years old have been preserved,” Ilya Altman, co-chairman of the Holocaust Center, director of the International Center for the History of the Holocaust and Genocides at RSUH, said in his welcoming speech.
On January 27, the Institute of History and Archives of RSUH hosted the opening of the 19th International Conference of Students and Young Scholars "Holocaust: Memory and Warning", dedicated to International Holocaust Remembrance Day and the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz camp by the Red Army.
Alexander Bezborodov, Advisor to the Rector of RSUH, addressed the Conference participants, saying:
"The most difficult and tragic history page is the years of the Holocaust, the genocide of the Jewish people during the Second World War. And today, more than ever, it is important for us to preserve this memory not only in our hearts, but also in research, studying this comprehensively".
Director of the UN Information Centre in Moscow Vladimir Kuznetsov noted that Holocaust Remembrance Day is a significant date restored by the General Assembly.
“The work carried out by the Holocaust Centre is very important to us, since these are issues of not only history, but of our present and future. It is very important to conduct research work and involve the maximum number of experts in this work,” he said.
Alla Gerber, Co-Chair of the Holocaust Center mentioned the equally important significance of warning anв prevention.
“We remember in order to be able to warn and prevent, because there is every reason to believe that man is still inhumane, that man still does not cause, does not become the face of creation, but on the contrary, is sinking lower and lower,” she said.
During the Conference, students made presentations on the Holocaust and its consequences. They touched upon the topics of the history of the Holocaust and experiments conducted on people in concentration camps. Particular attention was paid to Auschwitz as a symbol of the Holocaust. Also, from January 24 to 27, the 25th International Conference of Schoolchildren "Holocaust: Memory and Warning" was held at RSUH, where presentations were made on the history of the Holocaust in the Soviet Union, as well as the fates of people who suffered from the Holocaust and the importance of preserving the memory of this tragedy.
Let us also recall that on January 27, events dedicated to Holocaust Remembrance Day were held in Russia. The All-Russian memorial event "Candle of Memory" was held online, dedicated to the millions of Jews who suffered from the Holocaust.
