Interview: Austria's concentration camp to mark 70th anniversary of liberation

Austria will commemorate the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Mauthausen concentration camp from the National Socialist regime on Sunday, which Mauthausen Memorial Director Barbara Glueck has said is an important part of national history.

In an interview with Xinhua, Glueck said the site of the Mauthausen camp is a reminder of the political and racial persecution by the Nazi regime on Austrian territory, a history the commemoration day must keep in the public eye.

In August 1938, five months after the annexation of Austria to the German Reich, Mauthausen concentration camp was established by the SS, Schutzstaffel (English:protection squadron),the major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party, close to the Upper Austrian town of Mauthausen.

In total, almost 200,000 people from practically every European states as well as non-European countries were deported to the camp on account of their political activity, their "criminal record", religious conviction, homosexuality, for "racist" reasons or as prisoners of war. Half of them died there.

After Soviet forces turned the concentration camp site back over to Austria in 1947 and it became a memorial, Austria took on the responsibility to not only commemorate those who died there, but also to remind future generations of the horrors of the National Socialist regime, she said.

For this purpose the Memorial has developed its educational aspects such as a two hour tour of the site as well as workshops, directed not only at school students but also their teachers.

The expansion of these educational aspects have also targeted international visitors, who are able to see the full context of the ethnic, cultural, and political themes related to the site, helped through the addition of two new exhibits.

The commemoration on Sunday will also provide the chance for friendships made among Mauthausen survivors to be renewed, and for new ones to be created.

Glueck said for decades these survivors played a central role in the function of the memorial, though as their numbers are now continuing to dwindle, other forms of communicating the history to the public are needed, through museum exhibits, academic works, and educational means.

She also echoed President Heinz Fischer's recent statement that Austria was not simply the "first victim" of the Nazi regime, but also played a large role in persecution activities. While this is something that the population as a whole is conscious of, she said further work on education and resolution of this Austrian side of Nazi history is needed.

In an Austrian state ceremony last month, Austrian president Heinz Fischer Fischer said it must not be forgotten that many Austrians celebrated the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany in 1938, and not that Austria was simply the "first victim." Endit