The Trustees of the Soviet Memorial Trust Fund held a Holocaust Memorial Day commemoration event to mark the liberation of Auschwitz by the Red Army at the Imperial War Museum yesterday.

Camp survivors, veterans, local schoolchildren, representatives from the embassies of the CIS countries and the mayor of Southwark came together to for the event which finished with wreath-laying at the Soviet War Memorial and Southwark’s Holocaust Memorial Tree.

David Cameron has also confirmed yesterday that a national memorial to the victims of the Holocaust will be built in central London with a £50 million contribution from the government.

The PM said the contribution would go towards the construction of the “striking and prominent” monument as well as a “world-class” education centre.

Some of the money will also go towards an endowment fund to secure the long-term future of Holocaust education.

The Holocaust Commission said yesterday that it had found “worrying gaps in young people’s knowledge and understanding of the Holocaust.”