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Jews protest anti-Semitism in Hungary
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Hungary apologizes for role in Holocaust

In UN, Hungary makes first apology for role in Holocaust, amid local dispute over war-time memorial. 'We owe an apology to the victims because the Hungarian state failed to protect its citizens from destruction, secondly because it funded the mass murder'

For the first time, Hungary has taken responsibility for the role it played during the Holocaust, and apologized before in the UN, Hungary’s UN ambassador Csaba Korosi said.

 

 

“In this form and on behalf of the Hungarian state, nobody had ever expressed in the UN the responsibility of the Hungarian state for (its role in) the Holocaust,” Korosi told Hungarian news agency MTI.

 

Korosi said he would express Hungary’s responsibility in connection with the Holocaust in an event organized by the UN Office and the Hungarian representative to mark the 70th anniversary of the Holocaust.

 

“We owe an apology to the victims because the Hungarian state was guilty for the Holocaust. Firstly because it failed to protect its citizens from destruction and secondly because it helped and provided financial resources to the mass murder” Korosi said at the UN headquarters in New York.

 

“Hungarian state institutions at the time (shared responsibility) for the Holocaust. This apology today by the Hungarian state must become part of national memory and identity,” he further noted.

 

Acording to MTI, Korosi also outlined the planned Holocaust memorial events, which he said would highlight rescuers and child victims.

 

In speeches over the past several years, current and previous government officials have acknowledged Hungarians' role and responsibility in the Holocaust.

 

In October, Justice Minister Tibor Navracsics Hungarians had learned from the past and knew what had happened during the Holocaust.

 

However, Hungarian Jewish groups called for the government to cancel plans to erect a large memorial to the country's March 1944 occupation by Germany.

 

Critics see the statue as part of efforts by the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban to blur the responsibility of Hungarian officials and security forces in the deportations of Jews during the Holocaust.

 

Hungary is marking the 70th anniversary of the deportation of over 430,000 Hungarian Jews to Nazi death camps in just a couple of months after the German invasion.

 

The Associated Press contributed to this report

 


פרסום ראשון: 01.25.14, 14:40
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