The King has said the testimony of Holocaust survivors teaches us to “never be a bystander in the face of violence and hate” as he met those who lived through one of humanity’s darkest hours.
Charles visited the heart of Krakow’s Jewish community as commemorations began marking the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the former Nazi concentration camp Auschwitz-Birkenau.
He told those gathered at the Jewish Community Centre (JCC) that remembering the “evils of the past remains a vital task”, and knowledge should be used to inspire people to “build a kinder and more compassionate world”.
The King during his visit to the Jewish Community Centre in Krakow (Victoria Jones/PA)
Commemorations at the concentration camp began earlier when Poland’s president Andrzej Duda joined Auschwitz survivors in laying wreaths and candles at a symbolic site.
Their tributes were left at a reconstruction of the Death Wall, the site where several thousand people – mainly Polish political prisoners – were executed.
In a speech, Mr Duda said “we Poles are the guardians of memory today” and had a duty to maintain the life stories of the survivors.
Elsewhere, the Princess of Wales will join her husband to attend a service in London on Monday to mark the anniversary.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer is also expected to attend and speak at the service, along with faith and civic leaders and survivors of the Holocaust and more recent genocides.
After meeting members of Krakow’s Jewish Community, the King gave a speech and told the guests to be in Poland to mark 80 years since the liberation of Auschwitz was “sombre and indeed a sacred moment”.
Polish president Andrzej Duda kneels in front of the Death Wall (Oded Balilty/AP)
He went on to say: “It is a moment when we recall the depths to which humanity can sink when evil is allowed to flourish, ignored for too long by the world.
“And it is a moment when we recall the powerful testimonies of survivors such as Lily Ebert, who so sadly passed away in October, and who collectively taught us to cherish our freedom, to challenge prejudice and never to be a bystander in the face of violence and hate.”
He added those lessons could not be more important in a world that has seen the “dangerous re-emergence of antisemitism” and remains “full of turmoil and strife”.
The King said: “As the number of Holocaust survivors regrettably diminishes with the passage of time, the responsibility of remembrance rests far heavier on our shoulders, and on those of generations yet unborn.
“The act of remembering the evils of the past remains a vital task and in so doing, we inform our present and shape our future.”
The ceremony centred around the recollections and thoughts of the survivors who stood before their peers, presidents, prime ministers and foreign monarchs to tell their stories.
On screens was shown an image of a railway carriage described as a symbol of the suffering of all the victims of Auschwitz concentration camp.
Marian Turski, an Auschwitz survivor and a member of the International Auschwitz Council, was the first to speak.
The frail elderly man said: “I believe our thoughts should now go towards this huge majority, those millions of victims who will never tell us what they experienced, what they felt just because they were consumed by the mass destruction.”
He use the “Shoah”, the Hebrew word for Holocaust.