Horrors of Belsen flood back for survivors

British military veterans were greeted with gasps, tears and murmured thanks as they marched into Bergen-Belsen concentration camp yesterday to mark the 60th anniversary of its liberation.

One elderly woman reached out to an old soldier, touched him on the arm and said "You saved us" as he walked past, tears welling in his eyes.

Another of the members of AJEX, the Association of Jewish Ex-Servicemen, had to be supported by his wife as he walked on, sobbing.

Survivors, their children and members of British forces who liberated the camp near Hanover, had gathered to commemorate those who died and to set a marker against such atrocities happening again.

Images from the camp - not a death camp like Auschwitz but one where Germans left prisoners to die of starvation and disease - were the first to show the horror of the Holocaust.

Christian Wulff, the prime minister of Lower Saxony, said Germany accepted responsibility for the Nazi attempt to wipe out Jews.

"Your presence here, this gesture, leaves us grateful and speechless," he said. "It shows you are giving democratic Germany a chance."

At least 50,000 people died in Bergen-Belsen before the British arrived. But such was their condition that another 13,000 inmates died soon after.

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