THE lives lost during the Holocaust will be remembered during a series of commemorative events in west Cheshire this month.

To coincide with Holocaust Memorial Day, Cheshire West and Chester Council has organised events in schools, colleges and libraries across the borough to enable pupils, residents and communities to reflect on the atrocities and consider their contemporary relevance today.

The annual event is commemorated on January 27 each year to coincide with the date of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army in 1945 and to remember the countless individuals who perished in the Holocaust, as well as in other subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur.

On on January 26, author and historian Anthony Annakin-Smith will give a talk at Winsford Library from 1pm to 2.30pm.

She will show and discuss original correspondence written by prisoners while they were being held in Second World War concentration camps and ghettoes, including Auschwitz and Dachau.

He will also be giving talks at Neston Library, Lache Library and Little Sutton Library.

On January 23, Chester Cathedral is hosting a conference for Key Stage Three schoolchildren with key speaker Joanna Millan, who was born Bela Rosenthal in Berlin in August 1942.

At the end of February 1943, Bela’s father was taken from the streets of Berlin and sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau where he was murdered on arrival.

Later that year, in June, Bela and her mother were taken from their home and sent to the Terezín (Theresienstadt) Ghetto north of Prague.

In 1944, when Bela was 18 months old, her mother contracted tuberculosis due to the conditions in the camp, leaving Bela orphaned and alone in the camp.

Members of the public are welcome to attend Joanna’s testimony, from 10.15am to 11.45am in the Nave.

This event is being organised by the cathedral in conjunction with the council and Standing Advisory Council on Religious Education (SACRE).

In Ellesmere Port the Council and University Church of England Academy (UCEA) are working in partnership with the Anne Frank Trust to run an educational project with students and workshops with local primary schools.

On February 1 there will be an open evening from 6pm to 8pm for residents to visit the Anne Frank Trust Exhibition at UCEA. The event is open to everyone and there is no need to book.

Cllr Karen Shore, CWAC’s cabinet member for environment and chairman of SACRE, said: “Holocaust Memorial Day is a time to remember, reflect and learn the lessons of the past and to understand where prejudice, discrimination, racism and intolerance can lead if left unchecked.

“We wanted to provide a range of events to remember and commemorate what has happened in memory of the countless victims of genocide and in the hope that such intolerance is never again allowed to flourish.”

Admission to the talk at Winsford Library is £2. To book call 01606 275065. For more information email libraries@cheshirewestandchester.gov.uk