Orbán visits Krakow, Auschwitz

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his wife, Anikó Lévai, have laid a wreath at the grave of the late Polish President Lech Kaczynski and his wife, Maria, in Krakow, the PM’s press chief said on Monday.

Orbán also attended a commemoration of the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in the afternoon together with several heads of state and government.

The prime minister placed a candle in front of the Hungarian memorial to the victims of Birkenau.

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Government official marks Holocaust Remembrance Day

Csaba Latorcai, state secretary at the human resources ministry, attended a ceremony marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day at Budapest’s Holocaust Documentation Centre on Monday.

In his address, Latorcai advocated “learning from the past, gaining strength from the sacrifice of the victims of 20th century dictatorships and from the example of those who saved lives”.

“It is up to us whether we promote peace or allow unrest to take over the world around us,” he said.

Tamás Kovács, head of the centre, noted that one third of the people who died in the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp had been deported from Hungary. “Their only sin was being Jewish or Roma, or being unwanted for some other reason,” he added.