The Embassy of Romania in the Netherlands organised the photo-documentary exhibition “Righteous Among Nations”, hosted by The Hague City Hall. The occasion of the event is Romania’s Chairmanship of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance.
H.E. Ms Brânduşa Predescu, Ambassador of Romania to the Netherlands, invited diplomats and other honourable guests for the opening of the exhibition, followed by a reception on 5 October 2016.
Ambassador Predescu, welcomed the honourable guests, and spoke about the black page in our history that is the Holocaust. A brief quotation of the Ambassador’s address follows.
“The Holocaust is part of the history of Europe and Romania. It is a part of the history of mentalities, policies and practices that negatively marked civilization and modernization and showed its confines. The tragedy of the Jews of Romania is a black page in the history of Romania during the period 1938-1944. The Holocaust is unique and must be recognized its appropriate value in education. It symbolizes the supreme Evil in our times because of the way in which plans for mass extermination of an ethnic community were designed and implemented for the first time using industrial means.
In the city of peace and justice, the only ingredients that bring out the best in us, humans, namely humanity, tolerance, generosity and lack of fear, we invite you to walk with us through these individual stories about humanity, about people helping people. We invite you to remember what cannot be forgotten and what should never be repeated.”
The Ambassadors speech was followed by words by Mrs. Nira Staretz, the cultural attaché of the Embassy of Israel in The Hague and Mr. Floris van Dijk, member of the Dutch delegation to the International Alliance for Holocaust Remembrance.
Mrs. Staretz mentioned the importance of teaching our children what happened, so that this should never happen again. Mr. Floris van Dijk spoke about the difficulty of facing your own past and the importance of fact finding and transparency, which will help to understand.
The exhibition features many stories, including that of Constantin Karadja, a Romanian diplomat born in The Hague, who saved over 51.000 Jewish lives. During his research Mr. Van Dijk found the original birth certificate of Constantin Karadja in the archives of The Hague. The Romanian Ambassador received copies of the original birth certificate of Constantin Karadja, and the birth and death certificate of his older brother as a gift.
Upon receiving this gift Ambassador Brânduşa Predescu expressed gratitude.
“This gift is more important than attendants can imagine. Karadja is a mythical legend. He represents a stepping stone in diplomatic education. He is the composer of the one and only bible of diplomacy. We are very grateful for this gift, which will be placed in the diplomatic archive in Bucharest.”
The ceremony was followed by a reception, where the honourable guests had the pleasure of tasting Romanian wines.
Romania is chairman of the International Holocaust Remembrance Allicance (IHRA) from March 2016 to March 2017, more information upon this subject can be found here: https://www.holocaustremembrance.com/about-us/chairmanship
More information about Constantin Karadja can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constantin_Karadja
