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Prof. Nora Fischbach appointed Honorary Consul of the Auschwitz Memorial in Venezuela
Prof. Nora Fischbach has been appointed Honorary Consul of the Auschwitz Memorial in Venezuela. She will support activities undertaken in the country as part of the Diplomacy of Remembrance of the Auschwitz Memorial.
The letter of appointment was presented to her on 15 June 2026 by the Museum Director, Dr. Piotr M. A. Cywiński, in the Hermano Lanza Auditorium at Andrés Bello Catholic University in Caracas. The ceremony took place as part of the conference “Introduction to Auschwitz”, whose speakers were Director Cywiński, Prof. Benjamín Scharifker, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Espacio Anna Frank, and Prof. Nora Fischbach.
The meeting was attended, among others, by the university rector Arturo Peraza, diplomats, including the ambassadors of Germany and Greece, representatives of the Friends of Yad Vashem, as well as students of the humanities.
“I am honoured by this recognition and regard it as a commitment. I have always believed that memory manifests itself in the here and now and prompts us to think about the future,” emphasised Nora Fischbach.
“Our experience to date in developing the network of honorary consuls of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial clearly demonstrates the considerable potential of this project. Today, for the first time, we are appointing an Honorary Consul in South America, in Venezuela. This can be regarded as a very clear signal that we do not want to confine this history exclusively to Europe and North America,” emphasised Director Piotr Cywiński.
Nora Fischbach has worked for more than ten years at Andrés Bello Catholic University in Caracas (Universidad Católica Andrés Bello), where she lectures on the history of the German Nazi concentration and extermination camp Auschwitz and the Holocaust. She also gives guest lectures at other universities in Caracas and participates in radio and television programmes.
Her understanding of the meaning and importance of the history of Auschwitz began in childhood and stemmed from the love her grandmother felt for her grandfather, which, according to her grandmother, enabled her to survive the most terrible times. In fact, all four of Nora’s grandparents were imprisoned by the Germans in concentration camps during the Second World War: her mother’s parents in Auschwitz and her father’s parents in Dachau.
On 16 June, the exhibition “The Experience of Auschwitz in the Art of Prisoners” will open at the Faculty of Law and Political Science of Metropolitan University (Universidad Metropolitana). It will be accompanied by a meeting with students entitled “The Holocaust in History and Memory”, attended by Dr. Piotr Cywiński and the newly appointed Honorary Consul, Prof. Nora Fischbach.
