Bradford’s Poet Laureate has written a new verse which he will unveil as part of a day remembering the Holocaust.

Gerard Benson has been commissioned by City Hall to pen the poem for Holocaust Memorial Day, on January 27, the date in 1945 Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated.

More than six million Jews and millions more gipsies, homosexuals and Nazi opposition figures were put to death.

This year’s memorial day theme, Untold Stories, aims to acknowledge the people behind the statistics.

Mr Benson said: “This is obviously a very, very important subject and a good opportunity to be able to say something about it.

“I think the general theme that genocides should be no more is pretty much universally agreed – if not adhered to. I hope this will give people something to think about.”

Mr Benson will read his poem at Bradford District’s Holocaust Memorial Day commemoration at Victoria Hall, Saltaire.

In the run-up to the event, libraries across Bradford will hold displays featuring images of victims of the Holocaust, Nazi persecution and subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and the ongoing atrocities in Darfur.

The poem will be displayed alongside poetry written by local children.