LGBTQ victims of Holocaust honoured

Germany commemorated the victims of Nazi persecution on the 78th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, placing a focus Friday on people who were incarcerated and killed because of their sexual orientations and gender identities.

Thousands of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people were arrested and thrown into camps during Adolf Hitler’s 1933-45 dictatorship, based on anti-homosexuality laws that preceded and outlasted the Nazi era.

The speaker of Germany’s parliament, Baerbel Bas, said the Nazis broadened Article 175 of the German penal code, which was introduced in 1872, to criminalize “kisses, touches, even glances” between people of the same sex, leading to accusations against tens of thousands of men. “That was often enough to ruin their social existence,” Bas told lawmakers during the solemn ceremony held annually by the Bundestag to mark the liberation of Auschwitz.

More than half of the individuals prosecuted for homosexuality were convicted, and many received lengthy prison terms or were sentenced to forced labour.