On 27 January 1945, troops of the 1st Ukrainian Front liberated the Nazi death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau. This date has become a symbol of remembrance of the Holocaust — a crime during which approximately six million Jews were murdered in the course of the Second World War. Nearly one and a half million of them came from the territory of present-day Ukraine, including tens of thousands from Crimea. Among the victims were also the Krymchaks, one of the Indigenous Peoples of Ukraine.

In 2005, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution establishing the International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The document emphasizes that the tragedy of the Holocaust serves as a warning to all humanity about the dangers of hatred, fanaticism, racism, and prejudice. Ukraine has officially commemorated this date at the state level since 2012.

At the same time, recent history painfully demonstrates that remembrance alone is not enough. Russia’s full-scale war against Ukraine has shown that passive commemoration of the crimes of genocide does not prevent their recurrence. What is required is active reflection on the past, continuous public dialogue, and vigilant attention from international institutions to systemic human rights violations committed by authoritarian regimes.

In recent years, Holocaust memorial sites in Ukraine have once again come under attack. Babyn Yar in Kyiv — a symbol of the mass executions of Jews in Eastern Europe — was damaged by a Russian missile strike. In Kharkiv, shelling hit the memorial at Drobitsky Yar, where thousands of victims of Nazism are buried. People who survived the Holocaust and Nazi concentration camps have become victims of a new war in the 21st century.

International Holocaust Remembrance Day is not only a day of mourning. It is a reminder of our shared responsibility to preserve living memory, to speak the truth about crimes against humanity, and to ensure that evil does not go unpunished.