.... a memorial stone has been erected at the site. In this way, they want to publicly show their historical responsibility.

"When we first started working in Belarus as a group of Germans in 1996, we would never have thought that help for drug addicts and forms of therapy could be so closely linked to the country's history, much less would we have suspected that our own family history was also involved," says Babara Kleist from Germany, one of the leaeders of the Drug Rehab Center in Belarus.

She has researched the history of WWII and the atrocities committed by Germans in Belarus and the role her family played during this time. German Einsatzgruppen in Belarus wiped out Jewish life during the war and destroyed more than 629 villages. 
Between 1941 and 1944, one in three inhabitants of the country was killed. Our team even learned of Belarusian children who were abused for blood transfusions for German soldiers until they died as a result.

"Given our history as Germans, it is important to take responsibility by talking about this history - and where our own ancestors were involved, to address this too. At the same time, it means helping drug addicts here to build a new life by offering therapy. I feel it is a great privilege to be able to work in this beautiful country and help its people," explains Barbara Kleist.

Today, the majority of the team at our Rehab Center in Svetlagorsk come from Belarus. Some of them are former drug addicts and have become free of their addiction thanks to the work of TOS Ministries International. They now lead stable lives. "For me, it was crucial that I saw and learned what it means to take responsibility for my life," says Anja Khralovich, a senior team member. In dealing with the events in Belarus during the Second World War, the team developed the desire to make the seemingly forgotten fate of the murdered Jews of their city publicly visible through a memorial stone.

This memorial stone was inaugurated on February 28 on today's town hall square in Svetlagorsk. That was the site where the entire Jewish population of a small neighboring village had been shot. In politically extremely turbulent times, it is not a matter of course that something like this is approved. The only condition imposed by the district administration was that the plaque with Russian and Hebrew lettering should be large enough.