YOUNG people in Hartlepool will be spreading the word about the Holocaust and the lessons which must be learnt from it at a special event next week.

Working with Hartlepool Council’s Youth Support Service, eight young people aged between 13 and 16 formed the Holocaust Memorial Group – Hartlepool to help other youngsters understand about the Nazi persecution and subsequent genocides such as those in Cambodia, Rwanda and Bosnia.

Over the past year group members Oliver Pinsent, Jasmine Sirs, Annabelle Napper, Caitlin Lloyd, Jake Hornsey, Lois Joynt, Kate Kenny and Lauren Culley interviewed people who experienced the impact of the Holocaust.

The group will share its findings at an event called Keep The Memory Alive on international Holocaust Memorial Day on Tuesday, January 27 in the Avenue Ballroom in Lauder Street from 6.30pm to 8.30pm.

The young people will launch a 16-page booklet which they have written for distribution to secondary schools and the wider community, called Never Again: Their Past, Our Future.

There will also be a screening of an interview between Oliver Pinsent and Hartlepool resident Frank Lavin, whose late father Wilf took part in the liberation of Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1945 while serving with the Durham Light Infantry.

Oliver said: "Our project has had a profound impact on us and we hope our event and our booklet will make the same impression on other people."

Entry to next week’s event is by ticket only. A number of free public tickets are still available from the Youth Support Service on 01429 284320.