Pope condemns "genocide of the Jews"

Pope Benedict, in his first major address about the Nazi era in his native Germany, condemned "the genocide of the Jews", and said humanity must never be allowed to forget or repeat such atrocious crimes. Speaking exactly one month after his election, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger also quoted from a famous phrase of reconciliation between German and Polish Catholic bishops issued in the 1960s: "We forgive and we seek forgiveness." The 78-year-old pontiff of the Catholic Church had served briefly in the Hitler Youth during the war when membership of the Nazi paramilitary organisation was compulsory. But he was never a member of the Nazi party and his family opposed Hitler's regime. He made his address in the Vatican after a screening of a new TV film on the life of his predecessor John Paul II.