One of the most important initiatives in the history of ensuring remembrance of the Holocaust was taken on 19 January 2020 in Brussels, with the adoption of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) 2020 Ministerial Declaration.
In an emotionally charged meeting, 20 years after the founding Declaration was issued in Stockholm, the Ministers of the 34 IHRA member countries reaffirmed their commitment to the Stockholm principles and renewed the Alliance’s goals in an inspired text outlining 14 measures.
The conference was addressed by Holocaust survivors and the honorary Chairman of the Alliance, Professor Yehuda Bauer.
Greece was represented at the historic conference by Alternate Minister of Foreign Affairs Miltiadis Varvitsiotis, who, in his remarks, set out Greece’s achievements to date in fighting anti-Semitism in Greece, including elimination of the parliamentary presence of the Nazi organization Golden Dawn.
He noted that anti-Semitism is prohibited in Greece, not only by law, but also in practice. He recalled Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ recent statement that Greece fully adopted the IHRA Working Term on Holocaust Denial and Distortion on 8 November 2019, becoming the first country to do so.
“In Greece, we want to keep the memory of the Holocaust alive,” he added. He referred to some of the Greek state’s initiatives in this direction, including the Hellenic Parliament’s passing of legislation on regaining of Greek citizenship by Israeli Jews who were born in Greece before 1945, compensation of the Jewish Community of Thessaloniki for the old Jewish cemetery that was destroyed by the Nazis, and restoration of the Chair of Jewish Studies (closed in 1935) at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, in memory of the Greek Jews, martyrs and heroes of the Holocaust.
He also referred to the goals of the 2021 Greek Presidency of the IHRA, which coincides with the bicentennial of the Greek Revolution. These goals concern education and the role of mass media in the process of fighting anti-Semitism and defending the memory of the Holocaust.
January 19, 2020