Mr. Marcelo Mindlin, Chair of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance,
Ms. Michaela Kuchler, Secretary General of the IHRA,
Members of the diplomatic corps,
National authorities,
Heads of Delegation,
Delegates from Member and Observer Countries,
Representatives of the Jewish community,
Welcome to Buenos Aires. It is a profound honor to open these plenary meetings under the Argentine Presidency of the IHRA. For the first time, the Alliance holds its plenary work in Latin America. That fact brings this agenda, with renewed strength, to a region called to play a larger role in the defense of memory, truth, and human dignity.
Argentina assumes this role with conviction. President Javier Milei has given this effort the highest political support because the fight against antisemitism stands at the center of our foreign policy and our moral identity. Our strategic alliance with Israel and our voice against hatred reflect one principle. Memory is a duty of civilization.
I wish to recognize Marcelo Mindlin, whose leadership and long service through the Holocaust Museum of Buenos Aires give this Presidency both authority and soul. I also thank the IHRA Secretary General and her team, our Ministry of Justice, and our Ministry of Human Capital, for a common effort that has turned commitment into action.
The motto of our Presidency is “Expanding the Frontiers of Memory”. That choice carries a profound conviction. Memory cannot remain confined to commemorations, archives, or anniversaries. It must travel across generations, institutions, borders, and cultures. It must reach societies before hatred reaches them first.
T.S. Eliot wrote these prophetic words:
“A people without history is not redeemed from time,
for history is a pattern of endless moments”
History does not disappear when societies choose to ignore it. It returns. Sometimes disguised. Sometimes diluted. Sometimes armed with new slogans and new language. Yet always animated by the same destructive impulse.
That is why expanding the frontiers of memory is not simply the theme of our Presidency. It is a moral responsibility for our time. Because societies that abandon historical consciousness eventually lose their ability to recognize evil.
Under this agenda, delegates will advance the work of academic, educational, and memorial institutions committed to Holocaust remembrance and historical integrity. Committees will address antisemitism, Holocaust denial, the genocide of the Romani people, and crimes against humanity. Experts will work on archives, Holocaust education, survivors in Argentina, and the presence of Nazi criminals and collaborators in our history. This task deserves seriousness, intellectual honesty, and concrete results.
Argentina wants this Presidency to serve as a bridge for Latin America. We want more countries in our region to know the IHRA, to use its tools, to adopt its standards, and to understand that Holocaust remembrance is a living defense against antisemitism. The IHRA Working Definition has shown its value as a practical instrument and as a moral compass. It helps societies recognize antisemitism when intolerance seeks institutional shelter.
Antisemitism never survives by remaining unchanged. It adapts to the fears, frustrations, and moral confusions of each era. It reinvents its language. It seeks new spaces of legitimacy. At times it appears through violence and terror. At times through intellectual distortion, social exclusion, or the normalization of intolerance disguised as political expression.
The symbols evolve. The slogans evolve. The technology evolves. The destructive impulse survives.
That is why this fight demands vigilance as much as remembrance. Antisemitism does not threaten only Jewish communities. It corrodes democratic life itself. It weakens the moral foundations of free societies. It transforms indifference into complicity and silence into permission.
For Argentina, this conversation also carries a deeply personal dimension. Survivors rebuilt their lives here in freedom and dignity and helped shape the largest Jewish community in Latin America. Our country also faced a darker chapter, when Nazi criminals and collaborators sought refuge on our soil. A mature nation looks at both truths with seriousness.
The Shoah was not only an assault against the Jewish people. It was an assault against the very idea of human dignity. It demonstrated how quickly civilization can collapse when hatred acquires political power, when truth loses value, and when fear replaces conscience.
For that reason, Holocaust remembrance carries a universal lesson. Historical consciousness shields societies from moral erosion. Education protects nations from repetition. And testimony preserves humanity from forgetting what must never become imaginable again.
That is why our Foreign Ministry has launched a project to protect and facilitate access to archives linked to the Holocaust and the Second World War.
Few voices expressed that responsibility with greater moral clarity than Elie Wiesel. He taught that neutrality helps the oppressor and that silence encourages the tormentor. His lesson belongs in this room. The memory of the Shoah demands vigilance, moral clarity and sound public policy. It demands from each generation the responsibility to make testimony stronger, clearer, and more useful for those who come next.
To the delegates gathered here today, Argentina offers not only its hospitality, but its full commitment to this cause.
During these days in Buenos Aires, you will discuss archives, education, denial, survivors, remembrance, and historical responsibility. Yet beneath every session, every document, and every debate lies something far greater.
This Alliance carries a mission of profound moral significance. Nothing less than the defense of human dignity itself. Because memory, by itself, is not enough.
Memory must inspire action.
It must shape conscience.
It must strengthen courage.
And that moral obligation must reach those corners of the world where intolerance still seeks legitimacy.
Argentina wants this Presidency to leave a lasting mark on the work of the IHRA and on the future of Holocaust remembrance in Latin America. We want this region to become a stronger voice in the defense of historical truth, democratic values, and human life.
You will find in Argentina a nation fully committed to that mission.
A nation prepared to lead. Ready to support. Determined to speak clearly when silence feels more convenient. Committed to defending truth when defending truth carries a cost.
The work ahead is demanding. The moral obligation is even greater. Yet few causes deserve our collective effort more than this one.
Let Buenos Aires be remembered as the place where this Alliance expanded its reach, strengthened its purpose, and renewed its moral conviction.
And let our work here prove that even in difficult times, truth retains its moral force, memory continues to illuminate nations, and courageous leadership remains capable of defending civilization from the return of hatred.
Thank you very much.