According to Olusegun Eroyemi, the spokesperson for the Jehovah’s Witnesses in Nigeria, few people know that the Nazis’ victims included thousands of Jehovah’s Witnesses, who suffered for their Christian faith.

Eroyemi asserted that Jehovah’s Witnesses, also then known as Bible Students, were “the only group in the Third Reich to be persecuted on the basis of their religious beliefs alone,” adding that the Nazi regime branded Witnesses “enemies of the State,” because of “their very public refusal to accept even the smallest elements of (Nazism), which didn’t fit their faith and their beliefs.”

He said Jehovah’s Witnesses were among the first sent to concentration camps, where they bore a unique uniform symbol—the purple triangle.

He added: “Of about 35,000 Witnesses in Nazi-occupied Europe more than one-third suffered direct persecution. Most were arrested and imprisoned. Hundreds of their children were taken to Nazi homes or reformatories. About 4,200 Witnesses went to Nazi concentration camps.

“The Nazis sought to break Witnesses’ religious convictions by offering them freedom in exchange for a pledge of obedience. They required the signee to renounce his or her faith, denounce other Witnesses to the police, fully submit to the Nazi government and defend the “Fatherland” with weapon in hand. Prison and camp officials often used torture and privation to induce Witnesses to sign.”

Eroyemi observed that the failure of Nazi coercion in the case of Jehovah’s Witnesses contrasts with widespread societal conformity to Nazi aims before and during the holocaust.

“The non-violent resistance of ordinary people to racism, extreme nationalism and violence merits thoughtful reflection on this International Holocaust Remembrance Day,” he noted.