Wednesday, July 22, marked the 84th anniversary of the start of the mass deportation of Jews from the ghetto to the Nazi German Treblinka extermination camp.
An estimated 300,000 Jews were taken to the camp's gas chambers within the course of two months.
The deportation operation ended on September 21, 1942, although trains also departed for Treblinka during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, which took place from April 19 to May 16, 1943.
This year’s March of Remembrance, the 15th event of its kind, started at 6 p.m at the Umschlagplatz, a collection point where Jews were assembled for deportation. It then proceeded along the streets of Warsaw’s prewar Jewish district.
The event was attended by officials including Lech Parell, head of Poland's Office for War Veterans and Victims of Oppression, and Mateusz Szpytma, deputy head of the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), according to media reports.
The Jewish Historical Institute, which has organized the march since 2012, describes its route as a symbolic "from death to life" experience, with the participants carrying Ribbons of Memory with the names of murdered Jews.
Marchers walked along a symbolic route along the streets of Warsaw’s prewar Jewish district. Many of them carried Ribbons of Memory with the names of murdered Jews. Photo: PAP/Paweł Supernak
The event included a tribute to women who fought in the Warsaw Ghetto.
"The march aims to preserve the memory of Holocaust victims and the history of the Warsaw Ghetto," the organizers said.
"This year's march focused on the experiences of women who lived in the ghetto, fought for survival and became victims of Nazi Germany's Holocaust policies," they added.
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Source: PAP, tvp.info, warszawa.naszemiasto.pl
Click on the audio player above for a report by Piotr Urbaniak.