Estonia unveils memorial for Holocaust victims in Tallinn

Last month a memorial was unveiled at the Liiva Cemetery in Tallinn in memory of Estonian Jews who were murdered in an anti-tank trench in the city and nearby in 1941.

300 to 600 Estonian Jews are buried in mass graves at the Liiva Cemetery.

At the national commemoration ceremony for the victims of the Holocaust which took place at the site of the memorial, Minister of Education and Research Liina Kersna said that it is the duty of adults to tell schoolchildren about the Holocaust in order to prevent such crimes against humanity in the future.

This year, the Ministry of Education and Research, together with the Estonian Institute of Historical Memory organized a winter school where students have the opportunity to learn about antisemitism and the Holocaust as a crime against humanity, as well as about the Jews as a nation, their culture, customs and history.

Minister Kersna added that standing at the memorial to the victims of the tragic crime against humanity on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, we recall our duty to oppose any attempt to deny the Holocaust or to justify any crime against humanity: “There are many tragic events in human history that we can remember in retrospect as very painful lessons. We must never forget these lessons.”

The President of the Republic of Estonia Alar Karis, the Minister of Education and Research Liina Kersna, the Head of the Diplomatic Corps and the Ambassador of the Republic of Latvia to Estonia H.E Mr @raimondsjansons and the Chairwoman of the Estonian Jewish Community Alla Jakobson spoke at the commemoration ceremony. The Israeli Ambassador to Estonia H.E. Ms Hagit Ben-Yaakov sent a written address. The final blessings were given by the Estonian Chief Rabbi Smuel Kot.

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Statements

Declaration of the EJC on the 80th Anniversary of the Liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau

The Shoah, the systematic and deliberate mission of the Nazis and their collaborators to annihilate the Jewish people, resulted in the murder of six million Jews between 1939 and 1945. This unparalleled atrocity in world history must never be trivialised, contextualised, or compared, as such acts perpetuate the suffering of its victims and their descendants.