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Polish minister in tribute to Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel

PR dla Zagranicy
Paweł Kononczuk 04.07.2016 12:54
Polish Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski has paid tribute to Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, writer and Nobel Peace Prize winner, who died in New York on Saturday, aged 87.
File picture of Elie Wiesel from 2012. Photo: EPA/JUSTIN LANE

File picture of Elie Wiesel from 2012. Photo: EPA/JUSTIN LANE

Waszczykowski said that he received the news of Wiesel’s death with profound sorrow.

He described Wiesel as “one of the best known witnesses of the Holocaust, a man who took up in his life the difficult mission of cultivating the memory of the Holocaust, spreading the message of peace, atonement and human dignity”.

Wiesel took part several times in the annual March of the Living, which brings young Jews from Israel and other countries to the site of the former Auschwitz death camp run by German Nazis in southern Poland, which was occupied by German forces in World War II.

Wiesel was a survivor of Auschwitz and other Nazi German camps.

In 2005, the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, he said: “The truth is that in this place, we have all the reason in the world to give up on humanity, but we will not give up on humanity. We have all the reason in the world to choose anger, and we shall not yield to anger. Hope is all we have, and hope is all we can give one another".

Last year, Wiesel received an honorary doctorate from Poland's John Paul II Papal University in Kraków in recognition of his academic achievements and his work to promote peace and defend human dignity. (mk/pk)

tags: holocaust
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