Declassified Russian documents reveal new details of Auschwitz liberation and Nazi war crimes

Russia's Public Relations Center of the Federal Security Service (FSB) has released newly declassified documents revealing new details about Nazi war crimes and the Red Army's liberation of the infamous Nazi death camp, Auschwitz, on Jan. 27, 1945.

Some 1.1 million people were murdered at Auschwitz and the vast majority were Jews. 

In 2007, the United Nations designated this date as the official annual Holocaust Memorial Day. This year marks 80 years since Soviet Russian forces liberated Auschwitz. The newly declassified Russian documents include photos, testimonies, a certificate of release from Auschwitz and a certificate commemorating a badge received in the Polish armed forces. 

The Red Army also conducted its own investigations of war crimes committed in Nazi-controlled Auschwitz. For instance, the declassified documents revealed the case of Józef Pietzka, a former Polish soldier who was taken prisoner by the Germans in 1939 and eventually became a Nazi collaborator. 

The published documents included Pietzka’s testimony concerning his role in Auschwitz.  

“I did have the opportunity to escape from the camp, but I did not do so because I did not find it necessary for myself to escape, because, being in the service of the Unterkapo and Kapo, I did not experience the difficulties of camp life. On the contrary, I lived well there, I was the chief and absolute master over the life of the prisoners," Pietzka said during an interrogation after the war. In 1946, the Polish-born Kapo offered more details about his role in the Nazi death camp. 

“As an overseer, I accompanied and was present daily at all the work carried out by my prisoners and, armed with a stick, systematically beat them because they worked slowly and reluctantly. Every night, my group alone brought from 100 to 500 corpses of murdered people to the crematoria.”

World leaders gathered on Sunday in the Polish city Krakow ahead of the International Holocaust Remembrance Day. While the event honored Holocaust survivors, World Jewish Congress (WJC) President Ronald Lauder warned that lethal antisemitism did not end in Auschwitz. 

“Many of us thought antisemitism had been extinguished forever,” Lauder said. “But now, 80 years after the war, that ages-old virus has come back to infect the world once again. That is precisely the reason why the lives of the survivors and the lessons of this terrible place are so vitally important today,” Lauder said. 

Global antisemitism has increased dramatically following the unprecedented Hamas Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of 1,200 Israelis, the largest mass killing of Jews since the Holocaust. 

Holocaust survivor Michael Bornstein, who was born in Poland, said he was shocked by the rising levels of antisemitism merely 80 years after the Holocaust. 

“Five years ago, I could have never guessed that my college-age grandchildren would see harassment and hate on their campuses. Now, they do. Five years ago, Israel was at peace. Tonight, there are still 90 hostages being held by Palestinian terrorists,” Bornstein said. 

Prior to the Holocaust, Poland was home to over three million Jews, constituting one of the largest Jewish communities in the world. Some 90% of Poland’s prewar Jewish population was murdered during the Holocaust by the Nazis and their local collaborators across Europe.