On 27 January 1945, Auschwitz—a Nazi concentration camp and extermination camp in occupied Poland where more than a million people were murdered as part of the Nazis' "Final Solution" to the Jewish question—was liberated by the Soviet Red Army during the Vistula–Oder Offensive. Although most of the prisoners had been forced onto a death march, about 7,000 had been left behind. The Soviet soldiers attempted to help the survivors and were shocked at the scale of Nazi crimes. The date is recognized as International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
Background
Between 1940 and 1945, about 1.3 million people (mostly Jews) were deported to Auschwitz by Nazi Germany; 1.1 million were murdered.
In August 1944, there were more than 135,000 prisoners across the complex. In January 1945, after the Red Army launched the Vistula–Oder Offensive and approached the camp, almost 60,000 prisoners were forced to leave on a death march westward.
Inmates were marched mostly to Loslau but also to Gleiwitz, where they were forced into Holocaust trains and transported to concentration camps in Germany. However, the liberation of the camp was not a specific...
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