A ceremony commemorating the deaths of six million Jews who were killed by the Nazi regime eighty years ago started at 5 pm (Greek time) at the area off Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland, the largest complex of concentration and extermination camps. It has become a symbol of the genocide perpetrated by the Nazis.

The world united to honor the memory of the Jewish victims of the Holocaust, along with millions of others who suffered unspoken atrocities under the Nazi regime.

Wearing scarves with white and blue stripes reminiscent of the uniforms worn 80 years ago, fifty survivors who returned to the site have been laying wreaths since the morning at the former Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

This act of remembrance honors the one million Jews and the hundreds of thousands of Poles, Roma and Sinti, Soviet prisoners of war who the German Nazis murdered.

The 50 survivors were joined by heads of state including UK’s King Charles III, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and Poland’s President Andrzej Duda will also be in attendance.

Canada, Croatia, Ireland and Israel are also expected to send representatives.

The message of the survivors at the ceremony is to tell the world what happened and ensure that it never happens again.

Greece was represented by newly sworn-in Deputy Foreign Minister Tasos Chatzivasileiou, Amb. Chryssoula Aliferi, the ministry’s special envoy for issues involving anti-semitism, and Daniel Benardout, representing the Central Jewish Council of Greece (KIS).