Merkel visits Auschwitz memorial for the first time
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Angela Merkel visits for the first time the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial on Friday after 14 years as German Chancellor.
Merkel, accompanied by Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki during the visit, will bring a 60-million-euro donation to help conserve the place where the Nazis ran their largest death camp.
The Chancellor said the donation, half of which comes from Germany’s federal government and a half from the regional governments, would ensure the memorial is preserved.
epa08048624 German Chancellor Angela Merkel (2-L) and Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki (2-R) with Director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum Piotr Cywinski (L) and Vice Director Andrzej Kacorzyk (R) attend to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum of former Nazi German concentration and extermination camp in Oswiecim, Poland, 06 December 2019. Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and German Chancellor Angela Merkel will visit the Memorial ahead of 75th anniversary of the death camp’s liberation. EPA-EFE/ANDRZEJ GRYGIEL
She will be the third German chancellor to visit Auschwitz. The trip takes place ahead of the 75th anniversary of camp’s liberation by the Soviets on January 27, 1945, and the 10th anniversary since the opening of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Foundation.
Merkel has admitted Germany’s responsibility for its atrocities in World War Two.
