Monument to Holocaust victims to be unveiled on Baltic Sea coast

It was there on the ice and cold water of the Baltic, on the outskirt of the village of Palmniken that Nazis gunned down thousands of women, men and children - Jewish inmates of concentration camps and ghettos - on the night of February 1, 1945. This brutal and cynical massacre became the last act of the Holocaust - mass destruction of Jews by Nazis during the Second World War.

Just a few inmates survived in this hell of the massacre. They described this outrageous crime of Nazis in Palmniken years later after the Second World War.

A commemorative sign to victims of the Holocaust was installed in the present town of Yantarny over a decade ago. The memorial "To victims of Holocaust in Palmniken, 1945" was erected now next to it. The monument shows arms of people, stretched to the skies, symbolising an attempt of dying people to catch at the life and appealing for assistance, as it were.

Well-known sculptor Frank Maisler is the monument's author. A Jew by nationality, he survived the war by a miracle, while his parents died in Auschwitz. Monuments by Maisler to killed Jewish children were installed in Berlin and London.

The unveiling of the monument in Yantarny rounds off events in the framework of Days of Memory to Holocaust Victims, staged in Kaliningrad since January 27. In line with the commemorative action, the regional state archives opened an exhibition for the first time of historic documents, describing the Palmniken "death march".

At the same time, the historical and fine arts museum mounted a large exposition "Palmniken 1945. While we remember, we live" which was organised with assistance from staff members of the memorial museum "Concentration camp Stuthof" from Poland.

"The death march" of Jewish inmates started precisely from that concentration camp in 1945 and ended in Palmniken.