"Suddenly out of Europe, which we believed so safe, there sprang a beast, it was unbelievable, in view of European culture, German culture. It was more than an evolution: it went very deep." (Aharon Appelfeld)

In 1935, following Nazi indoctrination, 100,000 German children were made to swear 'eternal enmity' to the Jews. Little could they have known that by the end of World War II over one and a half million Jewish children would have been deliberately murdered in their homes, in orphanages, in hospitals, in the streets, in the ghettos and the extermination camps. This was a massacre of the innocents.

When the war - which was to claim over 50 million lives - was begun by the German invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939, the Nazi Gauleiter General Frank had specific instructions to reduce the country to a "simple heap of ruins". The first victims to be singled out were the Poles and the Jews. This is where our story begins, following the fate of the Jewish people and, in particular, the children, the last eyewitnesses: the children of the Holocaust.

Three years ago January 27 was chosen as the Annual Holocaust Memorial Day. This date marks the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

Edinburgh is the host city for the 2003 UK commemorative event. This year the theme is 'Children and the Holocaust'.

At least 1.5 million children were murdered by the Nazi regime between the years 1933 and 1945. The vast majority were Jewish, but disabled children, Roma children and children in the occupied territories were also killed as a direct result of Nazi racial policies. The lives of hundreds of thousands of other children were also significantly affected.

As well as the National commemorative event on 27 January in Edinburgh's Usher Hall, a wide-ranging programme of public events has been put together, most involving or aimed at children and young people. The events will inform everyone, particularly future generations, about the Holocaust and the lessons to be learned from it, encouraging reflection on similar recent atrocities such as, Cambodia and Rwanda.

For full information on all the Holocaust Memorial Day events, please visit the website at www.holocaustmemorialday.gov.uk/edinburgh.

This event is promoted by Edinburgh City Council.