USHMM hosts educational seminar

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is holding a seminar this week for United Nations information personnel. The series is designed to promote the idea that public outreach and education can prevent future genocides.

At a groundbreaking seminar at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., participants will examine topics as diverse as the genesis of famous anti-Semitic texts and genocide in the Internet era.

The seminar, “The History of the Holocaust: Confronting Hatred, Preventing Genocide and Cultivating Moral Responsibility,” is the result of a new partnership between the museum and the UN Department of Public Information (DPI).

Information Officers from UN Information Centres in Paraguay, Colombia, Colombia, Argentina, Bolivia, Peru, Mexico, Panama, Trinidad and Tobago, Brazil and the United States are taking part to support educational initiatives on the Holocaust by Member States, mandated in a 2005 General Assembly resolution.

They are exploring how intolerance can lead to the breakdown of democratic values and, in its extreme form, turn into mass killing, according to DPI’s outreach division.

It’s good to see USHMM creating programs for the UN, but I can’t help but wonder if it woudn’t be more affective if the actual UN representatives and their staff were attending.

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