SCHOOL students will commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day at a special event at County Hall on Friday, January 27.

Students from Christopher Whitehead, Nunnery Wood, Tudor Grange and the Royal Grammar School will deliver readings leading the event through the eight stages of Genocide.

Students from King’s School Worcester will lead people in an act of commitment and students in the senior choir at Blessed Edward Catholic College will be singing Labe Siffre’s Something Inside So Strong.

Representatives of the civic and faith communities will light candles as an act of commemoration for those who have died in the five officially recognised genocides, the Holocaust, Cambodia, Bosnia, Rwanda and Darfur as well as those who have perished in unrecognised acts of genocide.

The Revd Doug Chaplin, mission development officer in the Diocese of Worcester has been part of the organising group.

He said: "The fact that one of the official genocides – Darfur – is still going on underlines that Holocaust Memorial Day is as much about changing the present and the future as about remembering the past.

"This year’s national theme – How can life go on? – is rich with stories of survivors who want to use their stories to help find justice: justice for the victims of the past, and a more just world so that we won’t make more victims in the future.”

All are welcome to the commemoration which will be hosted by the Chair of the County Council in the Council Chamber at 3.30pm.