‘Torn From Home’ Brendan O’Hara MP meets survivors of the Holocaust and genocide

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left to right: Laura Marks (Chair of HMD Trust), Ian Blackford MP, Brendan O’Hara MP, Joan Salter MBE

Brendan O’Hara MP meets survivors of the Holocaust and genocide ahead of Holocaust Memorial Day 2019

At the launch of Holocaust Memorial Day for 2019, Brendan O’Hara MP listened to Joan Salter MBE, a child survivor of the Holocaust, describe how at the age of three, was forced to flee from Europe and travel to America in 1943 without her parents.

Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) whose theme for 2019  is ‘Torn from home’, is held on 27 January each year and remembers the six million Jews murdered during the Holocaust, the millions of people killed under Nazi Persecution and in subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur. The date marks the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp.

Mr O’Hara said:

“The experiences of survivors such as Joan remind us all about the importance of marking Holocaust Memorial Day – a day when we remember the millions of people who were affected by the Holocaust and subsequent genocides. We must do everything in our power to ensure that these things never happen again, anywhere in the world. It is why I am here today along with my colleague Ian Blackford MP to make a commitment to mark Holocaust Memorial Day every January and I want to encourage people in Argyll and Bute to do the same.”

Olivia Marks-Woldman, Chief Executive of Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, said:

“As the world becomes more fractured and divided, we need to come together to learn from genocide – for a better future”.