US Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Photo: Reuters/Rebecca Droke

Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Monday highlighted the plight of elderly Holocaust survivors in Ukraine as they endure the ongoing Russian invasion during a speech at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) in Washington, D.C.

“Ukraine is home to nearly 10,000 Holocaust survivors, including an 88-year-old woman, Natalia Berezhnaya of Odessa,” Blinken said. “Here’s what she said in a recent interview, and I quote: ‘It’s hard to wrap my mind around the fact that in 1941, I had to hide in the basement of this building, and that I’m going to have to do that again now.'”

Blinken noted that one of the “unsettling truths of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum is that there’s never a time I visit here when its lessons do not feel deeply resonant. But I have to tell you, I can recall few times when that history felt so urgent, or the responsibility it imparts on all of us so pressing.”

Russia had launched an “unprovoked, brutal war on Ukraine,” Blinken declared. “Each day brings more harrowing attacks, more innocent men, women, and children killed.”

He stressed that this included “the five people who were killed in a strike on March 1, on a TV tower and the surrounding area on the outskirts of Kyiv, the same site where, just over 80 years ago, 33,771 Jews were killed by the Nazis in just 2 days, Babyn Yar.”

The Russian government “tried to justify this war by falsely claiming that it’s intervening to stop genocide, abusing the term that we reserve for the gravest atrocities, disrespecting every victim of this heinous crime,” the secretary added.

At the same time, the US is aware of other spots around the globe where “horrific atrocities” are being committed, said Blinken, before announcing that Washington has determined that “members of the Burmese military committed genocide and crimes against humanity against Rohingya” — a Muslim minority — in 2016 and 2017. It marked the eighth occasion that the US concluded there was sufficient evidence of genocide during a foreign conflict.

“One of my responsibilities as Secretary is determining, on behalf of the United States, whether atrocities have been committed,” he said. “It’s an immense responsibility that I take very seriously, particularly given my family’s history.” Blinken’s stepfather, Samuel Pisar, was a survivor of the Auschwitz and Dachau concentration camps.

“The day will come when those responsible for these appalling acts will have to answer for them,” said Blinken.