VILNIUS, January 27, BNS–Lithuania paid tribute to victims of the Holocaust Wednesday, reading names and recalling the stories of rescues of Jews during International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

The Vilnius synagogue is hosting a reading of the first and last names of Holocaust victims, followed by prayers and memories shared by Holocaust survivors.

Meanwhile, a gymnasium in Ariogala in the Raseniai district organized a national conference of school students to present dramatic rescue stories and share memories shared by representatives of Jewish communities from across Lithuania.

The aim of the conference is to foster historic memory and recall the Jewish communities along with their cultural, economic and social heritage and their tragic fate in the Holocaust. The participants are to be greeted by Israeli ambassador Amir Maimon and officials from the Lithuanian ministries of Education and Science and Foreign Affairs.

Faina Kukliansky, chairwoman of the Jewish Community of Lithuania, says attention from state institutions to Holocaust Remembrance Day is noticeably absent.

“I fear that the oblivion could lead to relapse. Over the years after the war, we have been trying to keep the memory alive so that people remember what they have done,” Kukliansky told BNS Wednesday.

International Holocaust Remembrance Day was designated by the United Nations General Assembly resolution on November 1, 2005, marking the liberation of Auschwitz, the largest Nazi death camp, on January 27, 1945.

Lithuania also marks Lithuanian Jewish Genocide Day on September 23, the day of the liquidation of the Vilnius ghetto in 1943.

Over 90 percent of Lithuania’s pre-war Jewish community of 208,000 was annihilated during the Holocaust, with Lithuanians often assisting the Nazis in the massacres.

Some 877 Lithuanians have been listed as Righteous Among the Nations for rescuing Jews from the Holocaust