The Local Germany

'Behind all the numbers there are human fates': Germany mourns 80,000 pandemic victims at memorial

Sun, 18 Apr 2021 11:26:32 +0200

Germany held a national memorial service on Sunday for its nearly 80,000 victims of the coronavirus pandemic, with the president urging the country to put aside deep divisions over Covid restrictions to share the pain of grieving families.

'They were denied a grave': Microscopic remains of Nazi victims given final resting place

Mon, 13 May 2019 12:36:15 +0200

More than 300 tiny pieces of human tissue from political prisoners executed by the Nazis and dissected for research were buried Monday at a Berlin cemetery, more than 70 years after World War II ended.

Remains of Nazi prisoners to be buried in Berlin decades after war

Fri, 10 May 2019 10:24:10 +0200

More than seven decades after the end of World War II, the remains of political prisoners executed by the Nazis and dissected for research will be given a proper burial in Berlin.

AfD banned 'indefinitely' from attending Holocaust memorial services

Fri, 25 Jan 2019 18:27:58 +0100

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party have been banned from attending Holocaust remembrance services at the Buchenwald Concentration Camp in the central German state of Thuringia.

'A night of hell': 75 years since the Hamburg firestorm

Mon, 23 Jul 2018 16:20:31 +0200

This week Hamburg looks back at the worst air attack on the city during the Second World War 75 years ago, which engulfed the city in flames.

Bavarian memorial to honour forced labourers of forgotten Nazi camp

Fri, 27 Apr 2018 11:45:31 +0200

Germany will on Friday inaugurate a memorial at the long-forgotten site of a World War II Nazi concentration camp where forced labourers built an aircraft factory deep inside a Bavarian forest.

Emotions run high at Munich Olympic massacre memorial opening

Wed, 06 Sep 2017 17:44:06 +0200

Widows and children of 11 Israeli Olympic team members murdered during the 1972 Games in Munich unveiled a memorial to the victims at a tearful ceremony on Wednesday.

EU to host Helmut Kohl memorial ceremony in Strasbourg on July 1

Wed, 21 Jun 2017 11:02:15 +0200

The EU will hold a memorial ceremony in the eastern French city of Strasbourg on July 1 to remember former German chancellor and European "visionary" Helmut Kohl, a statement said Tuesday.

AfD politician banned from Holocaust memorial after Nazi comments

Thu, 26 Jan 2017 18:23:36 +0100

A regional head of the right-wing AfD party has been banned from a Holocaust Memorial Day event after making a speech in which he called on Germany to end its culture of remembering Nazi crimes.

Bowie gets a memorial plaque at former Berlin home

Mon, 22 Aug 2016 14:13:32 +0200

Berlin officials will commemorate David Bowie on Monday with a plaque in the district of Schöneberg, where he lived in the late 1970s.

Munich shooting memorial calls for tolerance and peace

Mon, 01 Aug 2016 11:05:29 +0200

Munich paid tribute to nine victims of a shooting rampage on Sunday, with Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Joachim Gauck attending the memorials that called on people to resist slipping into fear and hatred.

20 years of remembering the Holocaust on German streets

Tue, 03 May 2016 17:29:46 +0200

20 years ago today, on May 3rd 1996, the first Stolpersteine - brass plaques laid in the street to remember Holocaust victims - were laid in Berlin. They have now spread all across Europe.

Munich Jews feud over Holocaust remembrance

Thu, 26 Nov 2015 16:43:37 +0100

A bitter fight has broken out in Munich’s Jewish community over how to remember the victims of the Holocaust, with one group now taking the city to court.

Munich upholds ban on Jewish 'memory blocks'

Wed, 29 Jul 2015 14:41:46 +0200

The Munich City Council said on Wednesday that it had voted to continue banning the placement of blocks commemorating Jewish Holocaust victims in city streets - a ban that garnered surprising support from Jewish community leaders.

Germanwings memorial held in Barcelona

Mon, 13 Apr 2015 13:37:42 +0200

Spain's foreign minister was joined by his French and German counterparts on Monday for a memorial to the victims of Germanwings flight 4U9525.

Pressure mounts to allow 'Stolpersteine' in Munich

Wed, 21 Jan 2015 11:04:57 +0100

After banning them in 2004, Munich is poised to allow the small brass Holocaust memorial plaques known as 'Stolpersteine' to be placed on the streets, despite a Jewish community leader's continued opposition.

Berlin to open memorial to Nazis' disabled victims

Sun, 31 Aug 2014 10:38:00 +0200

Benjamin Traub, a sad-eyed German boy born in 1914, was considered a bright child by his parents and called gifted by his teachers. His life would end in a Nazi gas chamber.

Thousands form human chain in Dresden

Fri, 14 Feb 2014 12:01:00 +0100

Thousands of people gathered in Dresden on Thursday night to remember the destruction of the city by Allied bombers in World War II. For the first time in more than a decade neo-Nazis stayed away from the memorial.

Germany commemorates victims of Nazism

Mon, 27 Jan 2014 16:11:00 +0100

Almost 70 years after the liberation of Auschwitz and the end of the siege of Leningrad, German politicians remembered the victims of National Socialism on Monday.

App creates virtual Holocaust memorials

Tue, 22 Oct 2013 13:23:00 +0200

Stolpersteine - inscribed stones set in the ground in memory of Nazi victims - have caused controversy in Munich. Nine years ago an artist was banned from putting new ones up. But now a phone app will create virtual memorials.