UN Geneva to Mark the International Holocaust Remembrance Day

under Theme “Home and Belonging”

Every year on 27 January, the international community comes together to commemorate the International Holocaust Remembrance Day. This Day was chosen by the United Nations General Assembly to mark the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi Concentration and Extermination Camp in 1945.

The 2023 theme, “Home and Belonging”, highlights the multidimensional human needs of victims of atrocity crimes and the dangers of hate speech, antisemitism, Holocaust distortion and denial, and prejudice.

On 27 January 2023 at 13:00 hrs CET in Room XVIII at the Palais des Nations, the United Nations Office at Geneva will host an official commemoration, at which Holocaust survivor Avraham Roet, 94, will share his poignant story of loss and survival. The ceremony will also include remarks by António Guterres, UN Secretary-General; Tatiana Valovaya, UN Geneva Director-General; Ambassador Meirav Eilon Shahar, Permanent Representative of Israel to the United Nations in Geneva; and a representative of the European Union. Musicians Amit Weiner, Yael Yekel, and Marc Crofts will perform music composed during the Holocaust.

The event will be webcast live at UNTV and on UN Geneva’s Facebook page. To attend the commemoration in person, please register here.

In addition, the United Nations Office at Geneva, together with the EU Delegation and the Permanent Missions of Israel, Slovakia, and Czechia, the World Jewish Congress, and ASWE will organize an exhibition entitled "Days Beyond Time - Artist Meets Testimony". This exhibition, created by Beit Theresienstadt in Israel, will be showcased for the first time outside of Israel from 26 January to 20 February at D10 ArtSpace at Rue Ami-Lullin 6, Geneva. It will bring together artworks created in the Theresienstadt Ghetto during the Holocaust and new artworks by young Israeli artists of the third generation, who were inspired by testimonies of Holocaust survivors of Ghetto Theresienstadt.