Auschwitz liberation day has become International Holocaust Remembrance Day
When the assault quad commanded by major Anatoly Shapiro, a native of Krasnohrad, Kharkiv region, approached Auschwitz on the night of January 26–27, 1945, it turned out that the camp gates were heavily mined.
While the sappers cleared the passage, Shapiro and his fighters explored the surrounding area and found a group of prisoners in a nearby factory who continued to work waiting for their rations, although a week had already passed since the Nazis left.
At three o’clock in the morning on January 27, the gates of Auschwitz were opened. Only about 7,500 people remained half-alive in the huge area comparable to an average city. 58,000 prisoners, who were more or less able to work, were driven by the Nazis deep into the regions not yet occupied by the allied forces.
However, even of those who survived to the day of release, 3,000 people died of exhaustion and diseases in the first two weeks.
In total, about 1.5 million Jews were exterminated in Auschwitz during the “final solution to the Jewish question” — a quarter of all victims of the Holocaust.
Auschwitz liberation day has become International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
