Romania to open first public Holocaust museum

10 October 2016, 7:37 pm

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Romania, which denied its role in the Holocaust for years, is to open the first state-run museum dedicated to the country’s Jewish community, once one of the largest in Europe before World War II.

The museum, due to open in 2018 in the capital Bucharest, will focus on the persecution of Jews and the Roma, says Alexandru Florian, the director of the National Institute for the Study of the Holocaust.

“It will illustrate the role played by Jews in Romania’s modernization, as well as fight prejudice and the denial of the Shoah,” Florian tells AFP.

So far, the privately-run museum in Bucharest’s Holy Union Temple synagogue has been the main custodian of Jewish history in Romania.

— AFP