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Poland praises passage of UN Holocaust denial resolution

The United Nations’ General Assembly, on Thursday, unanimously passed a resolution on combating Holocaust denial on social media, along with amendments proposed by Poland.

The resolution was adopted on the 80th anniversary of the Wannsee conference, during which a group of Third Reich leaders had approved the “Final Solution to the Jewish Question.”

It is the first unanimously adopted UN official document including a Holocaust definition based on the one approved by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) in 2013. It provides a clear definition of Holocaust denial and makes social media and internet companies responsible for removing such posts.

According to Poland’s Permanent Representation at the UN, the resolution includes amendments proposed by Poland, since, according to the IHRA definition, Holocaust denial also means attempts to diffuse responsibility for German concentration and death camps and to blame other nations for these crimes. It added that this is of significance in the face of the recurring statements about ‘Polish death camps.’

Other amendments proposed by Poland included fragments honouring the courage and sacrifice of resistance movements fighting against the Nazis, and those praising people who helped and saved Jews during World War Two.

Krzysztof Szczerski, the Polish ambassador to the UN, told the gathering that “apart from the Jewish nation, it has been the Polish people, who have taken upon themselves a special duty to help preserve the remembrance of the Holocaust.”

“This has been caused by the fact that most of this tragedy had taken place on Polish territory occupied by the Germans,” Szczerski said, adding that Poland had been the first victim of the Nazi German attack over 80 years ago, and that the Polish people had formed Europe’s largest resistance movement during World War Two.

“Many Poles had risked their lives to help and save Jews, and to inform the world about the Holocaust, and after the war, they continued to protect the remembrance of the Holocaust,” he said.

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