Berlin 18-12-2009
Polish police have said that the iron sign over the gate to the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial with the now famous humiliating phrase ‘Arbeit macht frei’ has been stolen.
The police believe it was taken between 3 a.m. and 5 a.m. in the early morning and yet do not know whether it was a result of vandalism with a political motive or just the more stupid, mind-less random type of youth vandalism.
The local authorities have launched an intensive search and because of the huge international attention to the occurrence the pressure will be on to find the perpetrators.
The cynical and ignominious sign in English, ‘Work will mean freedom’ -was supposed to make prisoners think that it was anything but a death-camp.
It was put up in May 1940 when the camp was built and more than a million people who walked under it later died during its 4 ½ years of existence.
Its victims were mainly Jewish – men, women and children. It also included scores of Polish and Soviet political prisoners, homosexuals, people with disabilities, and Roma.
The camp was liberated as was most of Poland by the Red Army in January 1945.
Recently an agreement had been reached in Berlin to pay for up to 60 million Euro to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Foundation to help maintain the memorial and its museum on the site.
Tags: Auschwitz, stolen gate
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[...] [see former OTA-Berlin Constituency blog article- http://blog.ota-berlin.de/berlin/2009/12/19/sinsiter-auschwitz-birkenau-gate-sign-is-stolen/ [...]