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On 26 February 1943, the first transport of Roma and Sinti people from Germany arrived at the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp complex.

Light the Darkness was marked across the UK - and beyond - for Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) on 27 January. From 8pm, iconic landmarks were lit up in purple as part of the collective commemoration.

During this year’s Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month, historian Rainer Schulze reminds us of the systematic persecution the Roma and Sinti suffered during the period of Nazi rule in Germany and in Nazi-occupied Europe.

Born in 1927, Otto Rosenberg grew up in Berlin with his grandmother and two siblings. His family were Sinti, a Romani population of central Europe. Otto remembers living on private rented ‘lots’ of land that his family shared with the caravans and houses of extended family and other members of the Sinti community.

Johann ‘Rukeli’ Trollmann was born on 27 December 1907 near Hannover. He was a popular German Sinto boxer, who was discriminated against, marginalised, sterilised, and finally deported to a concentration camp, where he was murdered. Here, Rainer Schulze, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Essex, shares his story.

The HMD Partnership Group, facilitated by the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, brings together organisations that have significant reach across the UK and which work to extend the reach and impact of Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD).

After three and half years of Khmer Rouge rule, relations with neighbouring Vietnam had deteriorated because of the number of refugees fleeing Cambodia and because of border disputes. The Vietnamese invaded after being provoked by an attack ordered by Pol Pot.

Every June Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month provides a time dedicated to raising awareness of this community's past.

On the night of 2/3 August 1944, the camp where Roma and Sinti people were held at Auschwitz-Birkenau was liquidated. Thousands of men, women and children of Roma or Sinti origin were murdered in the gas chambers by Nazi officers. Their bodies were burned in pits.

On 27 January 1945, Soviet soldiers liberated Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi concentration and death camp.