On the occasion of today's commemorations of the 81st anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, Christoph Heubner, writer and Executive Vice President of the International Auschwitz Committee, received the Medal of Honour in Memory of the Ghetto Uprising in Warsaw today. This is the first time that a German has been awarded this commemorative medal.

The medal was presented to him by Piotr Wislicki, Chairman of the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw, and Marian Turski, President of the International Auschwitz Committee. Piotr Wislicki emphasized Christoph Heubner's decades of pedagogical remembrance work with young Germans and Poles with regard to education against anti-Semitism and xenophobia.

Marian Turski particularly emphasized Christoph Heubner's work for democracy in Europe as well as his literary work in remembrance of those murdered in Auschwitz and the survivors. He particularly recalled Heubner's tireless support for democracy at the Auschwitz Memorial and the International Youth Meeting Center and, above all, his initiative to set up the Gerhard Richter exhibition building in Oswiecim.