Task Force For International Cooperation On Holocaust Education, Remembrance and Research

Holocaust Memorial Day Events in the Czech Republic

• The Jewish Museum in Prague and the Jewish Community in Prague, in association with renowned pianist Professor Zuzana Růžičková, will give a gala concert at the Spanish Synagogue in Prague. Works by Felix Mendelssohn, Gustav Mahler and Benjamin Britten will be performed by Miroslav Vilímec, concertmaster of the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra.

• The Education and Culture Centre of the Jewish Museum in Prague holds annual seminars and lectures on the Holocaust for students accompanied by debates with survivors. A series of lectures and seminars prepared in cooperation with the Czech branch of the United Nations / UNICEF will take place in the UN House in Prague from 18 to 29 January, 2010.

• On 25 January, the Education and Culture Centre will further hold an evening dedicated to International Holocaust Day, entitled The dead forewarn us, the survivors bear witness. The event will include a discussion with Olga Klingerová, who survived the Holocaust as a child in hiding, and a video screening of a documentary by the oral history project Centropa.

• Exhibitions of the international project of the Jewish Museum in Prague, entitled Neighbours Who Disappeared, will be held in a number of cities in the Czech Republic and in Europe. The project launched in 1999 under auspices of the President Václav Havel and was prepared in co-operation with the non-governmental organisation Forgotten and with the support of the Terezín Memorial, the Hidden Child and the Federation of Jewish Communities in the Czech Republic. The exhibitions focus on students between 12 and 18 years and render tribute to Child Holocaust Victims. The project's main aim is to make young people elaborate on stories of people living in their neighbourhoods before World War II, who were then persecuted and finally exterminated.

• The Museum of Romani Culture in Brno commemorates the Holocaust Memorial Day on 27 January annually. In 2010 the museum will hold a four-day interactive programme for pupils and students in cooperation with the Jewish Museum in Prague. The programme will focus on both Holocaust and on the issue of genocide, racism and xenophobia and will be accompanied by lectures on the history of the Holocaust and the Samudaripen; discussions; meetings with survivors; screenings of short documentary films and an exhibition of photographs.