Foreign saviours in Hungary in 1944

As Hungary is commemorating the Holocaust, the Embassies of Italy, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the Vatican in Hungary have initiated a program (June 20-24, June 28, July 5) to remember the victims of the Holocaust and to honour courageous persons who opposed it and saved the life of Jewish families and individuals.

Among those persons who – often by risking their own life – saved Jews from deportation in Hungary, Yad Vashem has honoured 777 people as “Righteous Among The Nations”. They were mostly Hungarian citizens hiding the persecuted in their cellars or providing food. There were also a number of diplomats and other foreign personalities who used their position and influence to rescue Hungarian and foreign Jews, by protecting houses or handing out life-saving documents.

The program pays special tribute to Giorgio Perlasca (Italy); Angelo Rotta and Gennaro Verolino (Vatican, Italy); Henryk S³awik (Poland); Sampaio Garrido and Teixeira Branquinho (Portugal); Angel Sanz-Briz (Spain); Raoul Wallenberg (Sweden), Carl Lutz and Friedrich Born (Switzerland) and their foreign and Hungarian helpers.

The two main elements of the program are a series of walks along the historic sites – mainly in the XIII. district of Budapest – linked to the rescue-efforts and a series of movie projections.