{{German President Joachim Gauck has become the first senior dignitary from his country to visit Oradour-sur-Glane in France, where 642 people were killed by Nazi troops in June 1944.}}<\/p>\n
The ruins of the village are preserved just as they were after the massacre.
\nPresident Gauck said that he had accepted a French invitation to visit the site with “gratitude and humility”.<\/p>\n
More than 200 children were among the victims of the World War II atrocity that left deep scars in France.<\/p>\n
After the war Gen Charles de Gaulle – who later became France’s president – ordered the village not to be rebuilt but instead remain a memorial to the evils of Nazi
\noccupation. A new village was built nearby.<\/p>\n
{{‘Symbol of reconciliation’}}<\/p>\n
“I want to reach out to the victims and tell them: I am at your side,” President Gauck told Europe 1 radio ahead of the visit.<\/p>\n
“I am 73-years-old, I was born during the war, I was steeped in the discussion of our guilt… I will tell the victims and their families: ‘We know what was done.'”<\/p>\n
Mr Gauck said on Tuesday that he would not refrain from making the point to others during his visit that “the Germany that I have the honour of representing is a different Germany from the one that haunts their memories”.<\/p>\n
He was joined in Oradour-sur-Glane by his French counterpart, Francois Hollande, and together they visited the village square, where residents were rounded up by Nazi troops ostensibly to have their identity papers checked.<\/p>\n
They also walked around a church where women and children were incarcerated before it was set on fire. The village’s men were taken to a barn where they were shot with machine-guns.<\/p>\n
The two presidents were accompanied by two of the three living survivors, including 88-year-old Robert Hebras.<\/p>\n
He was 19 at the time of the massacre, and survived because he was buried under the bodies of other men who had been shot.<\/p>\n
“I was consumed by hatred and vengeance for a long time,” he said.<\/p>\n
BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{{German President Joachim Gauck has become the first senior dignitary from his country to visit Oradour-sur-Glane in France, where 642 people were killed by Nazi troops in June 1944.}} The ruins of the village are preserved just as they were after the massacre. President Gauck said that he had accepted a French invitation to visit […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2000048063,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[101],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-10196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-internationl","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":{"id":2000048063,"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10196.jpg","alt":"","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","width":0,"height":0,"sizes":{"thumbnail":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10196.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10196.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"medium_large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10196.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"large":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10196.jpg","width":1,"height":1},"full":{"url":"https:\/\/en-images.igihe.com\/IMG\/logo\/arton10196.jpg","width":0,"height":0}}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10196","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10196"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10196\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2000048063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10196"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10196"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10196"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=10196"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=10196"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}