April 2025 — International youth meeting in Buchenwald

27. September 2024

Some will remember the spring of 2008, when the International Federation of Resistance Fighters (FIR) and the then “Institut des Veterans” (IV) (Belgium) hosted an international youth meeting entitled “Train des Milles” (“Train of a Thousand”) at the Buchenwald Concentration Camp Memorial. The title of the meeting was reminiscent of the historic deportation trains from Brussels to the extermination camps in the east, in which around 1000 people were deported to extermination per train. A large number of participants from all over Europe started in the Belgian capital and took a special train to Weimar, where the youth meeting took place. Several hundred young people from Thuringia and other parts of Germany awaited them in Weimar. There they learned about the history of the Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora concentration camps and took part in various events. At that time, there was still the opportunity to talk to contemporary witnesses. The memorial march from Weimar to the Ettersberg made a big impression. There, after the event organized by the International Committee Buchenwald-Dora and Commandos (IKBD), the meeting ended with a “Youth Rally” at the bell tower. Representatives of the IKBD, the Belgian government and young people spoke here, reaffirming the legacy of the Buchenwald survivors with their words. It was not only the commemoration that was remembered, but also the European meeting of young people under the label of anti-fascist remembrance. When people talk about a united Europe today, it is the joint action of all parts of the anti-Hitler coalition that forms the basis of this transnational unity.

In the following years, further youth meetings were held in this format at the Auschwitz Memorial, at this occasion with the help of the Auschwitz Foundation (Belgium). In 2020, a youth meeting that had already been prepared fell victim to the coronavirus pandemic. Nevertheless, everyone involved was convinced that this form of historical education work with young people should be continued. Last fall, Jean Cardoen and Jill Lampaert presented their experiences with visits to the Buchenwald Concentration Camp Memorial at the congress in Barcelona and presented the planned project of an international youth meeting there. Following various preliminary discussions, the project has now been finalized to such an extent that we can now provide all member associations and interested parties with initial, binding information.

For April 2025, the Belgian War Heritage Institute (WHI — successor to the IV) and the FIR, in consultation with the IKBD, are now preparing a repeat of the impressive youth event held in 2008 to mark the IKBD’s liberation ceremony in Buchenwald.
The plan is for all participants to arrive on Friday (April 4, 2025), there will be intensive content-related activities on Saturday and Sunday, and the return journey of the foreign participants is scheduled for Monday (April 7, 2025). This schedule has been agreed with the IKBD and the Buchenwald Memorial. So far, guided visits to the concentration camp memorial by young people for young people, discussion groups on remembrance work, a joint concert, the memorial march from Weimar to the Ettersberg and participation in the IKBD rally on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of self-liberation are planned. There it is planned that the Buchenwald oath will be repeated for future generations. A youth rally is also planned as the final event this year as well as — optionally — a short visit to Weimar as the “City of Classics” and the early NSDAP rule.

It is important for all interested parties to contact political and social youth groups, teachers and other multipliers in the second half of 2024 in order to obtain an overview of the expected number of participants in good time. In coordination with the Thuringian Youth Hostel Association, overnight accommodation capacities have been reserved, but these must be fixed until the end of the year.
It is essential that all young people familiarize themselves with the history of Buchenwald Concentration Camp and the significance of remembrance for today and tomorrow in the run-up to the meeting. This is an important prerequisite for ensuring that this meeting is not just a symbolic “one-day event”, but can have an impact on raising young people’s awareness for the future.