News

June 14, Oświęcim (PAP—Polish Press Agency). The 66th anniversary of the deportation of 728 Polish political prisoners to the German Auschwitz camp was marked in Oswiecim on Wednesday. June 14 is regarded as the day when the camp began functioning. Former prisoners, including some from the first transport, took part in the ceremony.

This is a book about Block no. 11 and the fate of the prisoners who carved inscriptions and sketches on its walls, doors, window sills, and ceiling beams—in many cases, before going to their deaths.

The Polish Sejm (parliament) has voted to make June 14 Nazi Concentration Camp Victims Remembrance Day.

Birkenau, May 28 (PAP-Polish Press Agency) Benedict XVI prayed for the "grace of reconciliation" at the site of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, where the Nazis murdered at least 1.1 million people, most of them Jews. "I could not fail to come here," the Pope said during a ceremony attended by almost 200 prisoners of the camp.

May 29, 2006, Warsaw – "This council is international because memory, too, must be international. It must be a memory that belongs to all of us," said Polish Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz during ceremonies marking the nomination of members of the International Auschwitz Council.

May 23, Bielsko-Biała (PAP-Polish Press Agency) – The historically original inscription reading "Arbeit macht frei" returned to its place over the main gate of the Auschwitz I-Main Camp on Tuesday morning. A copy had been in place since January. Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum head preservation officer Rafał Pióro told PAP that the original was reinstalled in time for the visit by Pope Benedict XVI.