Kosovo marked International Holocaust Remembrance Day on 27 January with a memorial ceremony at the amphitheater of the National Library in Pristina. Diplomats, institutional representatives, and civil society members attended. Organizers lit six candles in memory of the six million Jews murdered in the Holocaust.

Israel’s Ambassador to Kosovo, Tamar Ziv, said antisemitism continues today through threats, physical attacks, and hate speech worldwide. She warned that Jews still live in fear in 2026 and stressed the need to protect synagogues and Jewish communities.

President Vjosa Osmani said the Holocaust was an attack on humanity itself. She honored the six million Jewish women, men, and children killed by the Nazi regime and said the past must never become the future of children. Osmani said Kosovo understands ethnic cleansing through its own experience and reaffirmed Kosovo’s firm stand against antisemitism, racism, and all forms of hatred.

Germany’s Ambassador to Kosovo, Rainer Rudolph, called remembrance of Auschwitz a historic and moral responsibility. He said Germany will never forget the unprecedented crimes of the Shoah or the suffering of the victims.

Rron Hoxha spoke on behalf of his grandmother’s family from Gjakova, who sheltered Jewish people during World War II. He described months of hiding and constant fear.

The United Nations proclaimed 27 January as International Holocaust Remembrance Day in 2005. The date marks the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp on 27 January 1945.

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