People pay their tribute to victims of Holocaust
MORE than 150 people attended the borough’s commemoration of Holocaust Memorial Day Commemoration at Heywood Civic Centre.
The stone in the Memorial Gardens was re-dedicated by the Mayor, Cllr Ian Duckworth, his chaplain, the Rev Richard Bradley and Henry West, MBE, who escaped persecution by coming to Britain 80 years ago.
Committee members of The Borough of Rochdale Multi-Faith Partnership spoke of the path to genocide and of genocides of the last 100 years.
This was followed by a presentation on the current plight of the Rohingya people of Myanmar by Sajjad Miah, a member of the delegation that recently visited the refugee camps in Bangladesh.
He highlighted some of the atrocities and slaughter by the Myanmar military, exemplified by escapees who were in the camps.
The event is always held on or near to January 27, the date of the liberation of Auschwitz.
Councillor Neil Emmott spoke poignantly of his visit to Auschwitz and was particularly moved by seeing the suitcases with the names and addresses of actual people who were murdered there.
Candles were lit, one for the Rohingya and six, led by the mayor, for the six million Jews plus other groups who were exterminated in the Holocaust.
During the latter, Katie Geelan of Fiddlestix played the theme from Schindler’s List on a solo violin.
The event had a participation and attendance by all ages, including senior members of council, the chief executive and young people from the Youth Service, who had held workshops regarding the Holo- caust and at the end of the ceremony handed out photo cards of the art work they had created for last year’s commemoration.
Young people from the Music Service accompanied the communal hymn, which was led by members of The Carers’ Choir.
In attendance was Rabbi Warren Elf from Manchester and Sarah Mahmood, member of the Youth Parliament, who lead the Community Pledge for Cohesion.
The event was organised by The Multi-Faith Partnership and Rochdale Council’s Neighbourhood Services Department. Next year’s event will be in Middleton.