The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams is visiting the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi death camp for the first time, accompanied by the Chief Rabbi, Sir Jonathan Sacks.

The Archbishop and Chief Rabbi has been joined by leaders of the Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Baha’i, Sikh and Zoroastrian faiths for the day-long visit, the first of its kind.

The faith leaders are visiting the site of one of the worst mass exterminations carried out against the Jewish people as guests of the Holocaust Educational Trust’s Lessons from Auschwitz Project. They are accompanying a group of 180 school students aged 16 or more along with their teacher.

“The visit by the UK’s faith leaders will demonstrate their solidarity in standing against the extremes of hostility and genocide which Auschwitz–Birkenau represents and which are represented in Cambodia, Bosnia and Rwanda in modern times,” said a spokesman for the trust.

Over the past 12 months the trust has taken more than 2000 students on day visits to Auschwitz in an attempt to teach them the lessons represented by the Holocaust.

• Full story:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article5141311.ece

• Statements:

http://timescolumns.typepad.com/gledhill/2008/11/archbishop-and.html