Personal objects belonging to four Greek victims of Nazi concentration and forced labor camps were returned to their families during an emotional ceremony at Greece’s Foreign Ministry, marking the completion of the international #StolenMemory campaign in the country.
The initiative aims to restore historical memory by locating relatives of victims whose possessions had been preserved in the Arolsen Archives, the world’s largest repository documenting Nazi crimes.
Officials said Greece became the first country to identify the families of all its citizens whose personal effects were held in the archives. Greece also recorded a separate first through a state-led program involving schools in the search process, coordinated by the Education Ministry’s General Secretariat for Religious Affairs and the Foreign Ministry’s Diplomatic and Historical Archives Service.
Among the items returned were watches, a wallet containing coins, a ring, a pocket watch with its chain, a bracelet and a small pin. The belongings were handed to relatives of Evangelos Kerasiotis, Dimitrios Vafeiadis, Giorgos Sagmatopoulos and Nikolaos Fasouliotis.
The ceremony was attended by representatives of Greece’s political, diplomatic and religious leadership, as well as officials from the Arolsen Archives.
