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Poland marks 70th anniversary of Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

PR dla Zagranicy
Nick Hodge 19.04.2013 09:06
Commemorations marking the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, the doomed Jewish insurgency against the Nazi German occupier, are under way.

President
President Bronislaw Komorowski pays tribute at the Umschlagplatz monument in Warsaw, during commemorations marking the 70th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising: photo: PAP/Radek Pietruszka

"This was the last stand of people deprived of dignity and hope," President of Poland Bronislaw Komorowski declared during a speech at the Monument to the Ghetto Heroes, which stands on terrain which was once part of the Nazis' Jewish Ghetto.

"Hundreds of insurgents stood to defend the last remnants of human freedom," he said.

Komorowski
Komorowski (L) & Rotem (R): PAP/R. Pietruszka

Simcha Rotem, one of the last surviving participants in the uprising, also spoke, having been decorated by President Komorowski with the Grand Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta, one of Poland's highest honours.

Rotem travelled from Israel to take part in the commemorations.

“The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was the first act of armed resistance in Nazi-occupied Europe, and the final chapter of the tragedy of the Jews,” he said in his address.

“We knew that the end would be the same for all of us, but we wanted to choose the way we died,” he stressed.

“However, I am still troubled by the question as to whether we were entitled to decide to launch the uprising, thereby shortening the lives of many people by a day, a week or two weeks,” he reflected.

“Nobody authorized us, and I must live with these doubts."

The assembly, which included Mayor of Warsaw Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz, also walked to the former Umschlagplatz, where during the war, approximately 320,000 Jews were loaded onto trains bound for death camps.

Today's commemorations follow the adoption of a resolution in parliament on Wednesday honouring the insurgency, which began on 19 April 1943.

Events will continue at the partially completed Museum of the History of Polish Jews (pictured above), where Polish composer Krzysztof Penderecki is among those taking part in a concert honouring the insurgents.

In the evening, at 8 pm, the museum will also be hosting a jazz concert in tribute to Marek Edelman, who fought in both the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, and then the 1944 Warsaw Rising led by the Polish underground. Edelman later became an activist in the Solidarity trade union.

Several hundred partisans actively took part in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, which was finally crushed on 16 May 1943. It is estimated that about 13,000 Jews died in the ghetto during the revolt. The majority of captured survivors were transported to death camps, marking the final liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto. (nh)

Source: IAR/PAP

Be sure to tune in to a special edition of our News from Poland magazine on Friday, 14.00 CET, where we devote the whole programme to the 70th anniversary of the Jewish Ghetto Uprising and the opening of Warsaw's Museum of the History of Polish Jews. Click the 'listen live' on the home page and then click 'External'.

Participants
Participants in today's commemorations gather at Warsaw's Monument to the Heroes of the Ghetto. Photo: PAP/Jacek Turczyk

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