Commemoration of the victims of the mass murder in Latvia
City of Bocholt takes part in 4th commemoration and remembrance trip of the Riga Committee
Delegates from more than 30 cities of the Riga Committee, from Würzburg to Berlin, from Vienna to Rheine, will commemorate the victims of the Holocaust in Latvia over eighty years ago at numerous locations from 4 to 6 July 2022. The city of Bocholt will also be represented.
Riga, the Latvian capital, was the last stop on a journey to death for tens of thousands of Jewish people from the "Great German Reich".
This makes Riga one of the first places where Jews were mass murdered during the Second World War. For a long time, these victims, who were murdered in the neighbouring forests of Bikernieki and Rumbula, in Jungfernhof and Salaspils, were denied their own memorial. This was only able to develop freely after the end of the Soviet Union. The Riga Committee, founded in 2000, is working to return the names of the dead as far as possible and to create a dignified place of mourning and remembrance.
Delegates from the cities and municipalities of the Riga Committee will visit the sites of the events and commemorate the victims of the National Socialist atrocities. City Councillor Daniel Zöhler will take part in the commemorative tour as a representative of the city of Bocholt.
About the Riga Committee
The Riga Committee was founded in May 2000 by 13 cities and the German War Graves Commission. Its aim is to commemorate the deportation and deportation of their Jewish neighbours via Riga to the extermination camps in Eastern Europe. Today, almost 70 cities belong to the Riga Committee. Further memberships are planned for September.
Further background information on the 4th commemoration and remembrance journey can be found on the Volksbund website.