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Germany Dedicates Massive, Controversial Holocaust Memorial


Following years of debate and delay, Germany has dedicated a national memorial to the six million Jews killed by the Nazis during World War II.

Dignitaries and survivors of the Nazi death camps dedicated the "Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe" Tuesday in Berlin. The speaker of Germany's lower house of parliament, Wolfgang Thierse, said the memorial will keep the memory of Holocaust victims and of Nazi crimes alive.

The two-hectare memorial, designed by New York architect Peter Eisenman, consists of 2,711 unadorned concrete slabs and an underground research center

Experts say the memorial evokes the rigid discipline and order of the Nazi killing machine.

First proposed in the late 1980s, the memorial was only recently completed because of arguments over its size, design and whether it should honor non-Jewish Holocaust victims. It will open to the public on Thursday.

Some information for this report provided by AP, Reuters.

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