(CNN) – Thursday marks International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
The United Nations designated it January 27th to honor the anniversary of when Allied troops liberated the Auschwitz concentration camp in German-occupied Poland.
It was one of many such camps set up by Nazi Germany for the purpose of carrying out genocide and forced labor.
Jewish people were the primary targets of Adolf Hitler’s genocide plans with six million dying during the Holocaust between 1933 and 1945.
His regime also killed five million others during the same period, including political enemies, ethnic minorities, and homosexuals.
Historians and educators view remembering the period as vital to preventing future genocides.
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