On January 26, Kyiv hosted the opening of the exhibition “Auschwitz Concentration Camp – Ukrainian Dimension. Research, Documents, Testimonies” dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz and International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
The organizers of the event are: the National Museum of the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945, the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine, Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance, the G.S. Pshenychny Central State Archive. Museum “Jewish Memory and Holocaust in Ukraine” and “Tkuma” Ukrainian Institute for Holocaust Studies took part in creation of the exhibitions. Our Museum handed over a number of unique exhibits that would be on display at the Museum of the Great Patriotic War along with other exhibits.
The exhibition presents about 300 objects that tell the story of our compatriots – prisoners of the Nazi concentration camp and soldiers of the First Ukrainian Front, who liberated Auschwitz. Among the exhibits there are documentary materials of the participants of the liberation of a concentration camp and its prisoners: prisoners of war, members of Ukrainian liberation movement, Ostarbeiters, Ukrainian Jews.
The exhibition was opened by Vyacheslav Kyrylenko, Minister of Culture; Volodymyr Vyatrovych, Director of the Ukrainian Institute of National Remembrance and Ivan Kovalchuk, Director of the Museum of the Great Patriotic War. Igor Shchupak, Candidate of Historical Sciences, “Tkuma” Institute and Museum “Jewish Memory and Holocaust in Ukraine” Director took part in the opening ceremony.
The Minister of Culture said that we can draw parallels between those events and Ukrainian realities. “The conditions in which Ukrainian prisoners are now, all those mockeries only prove that between German Nazism and current Russian imperialism there is almost no difference” – Vyacheslav Kyrylenko is quoted by UNIAN site.
The event ended with a round table, which was attended by prominent Ukrainian historians
Dr. V. Vyatrovych, Prof. A. Lysenko, V. Nachmanowych, Prof. I. Patryliak, Dr. Igor Shchupak and others.