80th anniversary of the self-liberation of Buchenwald concentration camp — Successful international youth meeting

8. April 2025

As previously reported, on the initiative of FIR, the Belgian National Confederation of Political Prisoners (CNPPA) and the Belgian War Heritage Institute, around 500 young people came together for an international youth meeting at the Buchenwald Memorial. Together with the International Committee Buchenwald-Dora and Commandos (IKBD), the German Buchenwald-Dora camp communities and “Paint it read”, they commemorated the self-liberation of the camp 80 years ago on April 11, 1945. Participants from ten European countries from Portugal to Hungary, the largest group from various parts of Belgium, learned from the memory of the camp’s inmates and survivors.
The highlight of the meeting was the joint commemorative walk of the young people from the obelisk along the memorial path and the Blood Road to the memorial.


In the memorial, impressive commemorative events took place at the national pillars before in the “Rally of the Youth” statements were recited in various languages on the square in front of the bell tower. Finally, the young people laid hundreds of flowers at the impressive sculpture by Fritz Cremer and at other places in the memorial.
With their joint participation in the IKBD rally on the roll call square, they honored the political legacy of the survivors, as expressed in the “Oath of Buchenwald”: “Destruction of Nazism with its roots” and “Creation of a new world of peace and freedom”. This is also a task for today and tomorrow.