Speech by Zoni Weisz to the German Budestag

Remembrance of the Victims of National Socialism


On 27 January, the German Bundestag held a Ceremony of Remembrance for the victims of National Socialism. Parliament has held a ceremony each year since 1996 on this date, on which the Auschwitz concentration camp was liberated in 1945. The guest speaker this year was Mr Zoni Weisz, a Holocaust survivor from the Netherlands and representative of the Sinti. A video of the speech is on the Budestag home page.

In 2005, January 27 was been declared International Holocaust Remembrance Day by the United Nations. This year the Remembrance speech to the German Bundestag was give by Zoni Weisz, a member of the Sinti, a part of the Roma minority. Along with six million Jews and millions of others, 500,000 Roma were murdered in the Holocaust. The Roma continue to be a persecuted minority within Europe, see the webpage of the European Roma Rights Centre.

The Academy on Human Rights and Humanitarian Law presents:

Human Rights Month

RSVP: www.wcl.american.edu/secle/cle_form.cfm

All panels will take place at:

American University, Washington College of Law, Rm. 603, 12:30 -2pm

Each year, the Academy sponsors a month of events dedicated to human rights theory. It is an opportunity to share experiences and network with fellow practitioners and internationally known scholars and activists. We hope that you can join us for some—or all—of these events. For more information, please visit us at: www.wcl.american.edu/hracademy

Panels

• June 3: International Law and Transitional Processes: Contemporary Challenges
  
• June 7: Assessing the Impact of International Law and Institutions in the Protection of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights: Challenges Ahead
  
• June 9: The International Human Rights Status of Elderly Rights: Current Trends
  
• June 11: International Humanitarian Law and International Human Rights Law: the Scope of their Relationship in Theory and Practice
  

V Annual Meeting on Human Rights

• June 14: A Regional Comparison of Human Rights Systems: Africa, America, Asia and Europe
  
• June 15: Recent Developments in the Inter-American Human Rights System: a Debate on the New Procedural Rules of the Commission and Court and their Future Application