Weimar (dpa/th) – near Weimar, a memorial tree intended to commemorate the victims of the Buchenwald Nazi concentration camp was damaged again. Walkers noticed a cut in the trunk of the beech on Sunday, the police said on Monday. The Jena criminal police are investigating. Several memorial trees dedicated to prisoners of the Buchenwald concentration camp or children murdered in Buchenwald had already been damaged in the summer.
The tree now affected is located on the Ilmtal cycle path between the communities of Kromsdorf and Oßmannstedt near Weimar and is part of the “1000 beeches” project. The trees also commemorate the “death marches” of concentration camp prisoners. The term stands for the evacuation of the camp, which the Nazis began shortly before its liberation in early April 1945. Thousands of prisoners were herded towards other camps such as Flossenbürg and Dachau, many did not survive.
Only on Wednesday were symbolically new memorial trees set. They were originally intended to replace the trees damaged in the summer, but are now supplementing them as almost all of the trees have been saved.