UN backs Auschwitz name change

The United Nations has agreed to rename Auschwitz concentration camp to stress that Nazi Germans, not Poles, were responsible for the world's most notorious death camp.

Poland's Culture Ministry said on Wednesday that ''Auschwitz Concentration Camp'' would be renamed ''the Former Nazi German Concentration Camp of Auschwitz''.

Poland asked the UN in April to rename Auschwitz, where 1.5 million people, mostly Jews, were executed or worked to death during World War II.

Warsaw had objected to references to ''Polish gas chambers'' at the ''Polish concentration camp'' in foreign media.

Nearly three million non-Jewish Poles died under Nazi rule, and Poles see themselves as victims of the war. Any discussion of the role played by Poles in the death camps is a sore topic.

This month, Jewish and Polish officials marked anniversaries of two massacres of Jews carried out by Poles before and after World War II.

Many historians have said that Poles assisted the Nazis at Auschwitz, where 6000 people died every day during 1944.

In their defence, Poles have argued that many of their citizens risked their lives to hide Jews.

Poles are the largest group awarded Israel's Righteous Among the Nations title for helping to save Jews.