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Auschwitz Blueprints Go on Display in Berlin

Original blueprints showing construction plans for the Auschwitz death camp have gone on display in Berlin in an exhibition opened on Monday evening by a survivor, 86-year-old former Polish Foreign Minister Vladislav Bartoszewski.

"The exhibition gives a shocking insight into the abyss," Bartoszweski said in a speech, "even if the objects on display seem harmless. Or maybe precisely because of that. There are blueprints, building instructions. Technical drawings. Calculations and maps."

"The horrific thing about them lies in their systematic nature. In their cold perfectionism. In their professional quality. The plans of Auschwitz shake the soul of every thinking and feeling individual because they're the expression of an inhumanity created by humans. They are the construction plans of true hell."

The exhibition is being shown at the Berlin headquarters of German publishing group Axel Springer, publisher of the mass-circulation Bild newspaper, until February 28...

Read entire article at Spiegel Online