A museum opens at a former factory in the Czech Republic where Oskar Schindler saved 1,200 Jews

BRNENEC, Czech Republic (AP) — A dilapidated industrial site in the Czech Republic where German businessman Oskar Schindler saved 1,200 Jews during the World War II is coming back to life.

The site, a former textile factory in the town of Brněnec, about 160 kilometers (100 miles) east of Prague, was stolen by the Nazis from its Jewish owners in 1938 and turned into a concentration camp. This weekend it welcomed the first visitors to the Museum of Survivors dedicated to the Holocaust and the history of Jews in this part of Europe.

The opening was timed to coincide with the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II. It was also in May 1945 that Schindler received a golden ring from grateful Jewish survivors, made with gold taken from their teeth. The ring was inscribed with the Hebrew words from Talmud, saying “Whoever saves one life saves the world entire."

Schindler’s story was told in Steven Spielberg’s Oscar-winning movie, “Schindler’s List."

Daniel Löw-Beer was a driving force behind the project. His predecessors lived in this part of Czech Republic for hundreds of years, acquiring the plant in Brnenec in 1854 and turning it into one of Europe's most important wool factories.

“We had to flee for our lives, lost a bit of our history, so putting a little bit of history back to a place and hopefully bringing out as well the history of Oskar Schindler and the village is what we’re doing today,” Löw-Beer told The Associated Press.

Today, his family members are scattered around the world. “I’m pleased to put a little bit, of course emotionally, of my family back in the place because they were survivors. My grandfather lived here, my father lived here, and then the world was shattered one day in 1938," he said.

The museum, housed in part of a renovated spinning mill, displays the history of Schindler, his wife Emilie, the Löw-Beer family and others linked to the area, together with the testimonies of Holocaust survivors. It includes a space for exhibitions, lectures, film screenings and concerts, as well as a café.

A transparent glass wall between this part and the bigger, still ruined area behind it separates the present and history.

"It’s a universal place of survivors,” Löw-Beer said. “We want those stories to be told and people to make their own opinions.”

In 2019 Löw-Beer set up the Arks Foundation to buy the warehouse and turn it into a museum, investing money and renewing a partnership with the local community to revive the neglected site.

The regional government contributed funds, while a grant from the European Union brought children from five European countries to Brněnec to come up with ideas that helped shape the museum design.

The official opening on the weekend completed the first step but a lot remains to be done. The remaining buildings are still waiting to be fully restored. They include Schindler’s office where the town hall plans to create an information center, the barracks of the SS troops, which will provide more exhibition spaces, and the entire building of Schindler’s Ark where the Jewish prisoners lived and worked.

Currently, the museum is not open on a daily basis and focuses on education activities for schools.

Previous projects to restore the site failed due to a lack of funds. In contrast, the Arks Foundation took a step-by-step approach. When skeptical local residents could see something was really happening this time, they offered help. A firm came with a big truck loaded with bricks, dropped them and just went off, Löw-Beer said.

“We wanted to show that you have to do something for something else to happen,” said Milan Šudoma of the foundation. If organizers had waited until they had secured all the necessary funding, nothing would likely be done by now, he said.

“Oskar and Emilie Schindler are proof that one person can make a difference,” the museum quotes Rena Finder, one of the Schindler’s Jews, as saying. “Everybody said there was nothing I could do. And that’s a lie because there is always something you can do.”

Schindler, an unlikely hero, was born in the nearby town of Svitavy (Zwittau in German) in what was then the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia, with a German-speaking majority and a substantial Jewish population.

A Svitavy museum said Schindler was a mass of contradictions: a troublemaker, a womanizer, a spy for the Germans, a Nazi but also a man who saved people from the Holocaust.

After the war broke out in 1939, Schindler moved from Svitavy to Krakow, now Poland, where he ran an enamel and ammunition plant and treated Jewish workers well. With the Red Army approaching in 1944, he created a list of Jewish workers he claimed were needed to resettle the plant in Brněnec.

When a transport with 300 women was diverted to the Nazi death camp at Auschwitz, Schindler managed to secure their release.

Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial center in Jerusalem, said it’s the only known case “that such a large group of people were allowed to leave alive while the gas chambers were still in operation.”

In another bold act, Emilie Schindler led an effort to save more than 100 Jewish male prisoners who arrived at a nearby train station in sealed cattle wagons in January 1945.

In 1993, Yad Vashem recognized Emilie and Oskar Schindler as Righteous Among the Nations, the honor awarded to those who rescued Jews from the Holocaust.

Visitors observe the Museum of Survivors, located in a factory where Oskar Schindler saved some 1200 Jews during the WWII, in Brnenec, Czech Republic, Saturday, May 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

Daniel Low-Beer, whose family used to own a factory where Oskar Schindler saved some 1200 Jews during the WWII, talks to The Associated Press at the Museum of Survivors in Brnenec, Czech Republic, Saturday, May 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

A visitor observes the Museum of Survivors, located in a factory where Oskar Schindler saved some 1200 Jews during the WWII, in Brnenec, Czech Republic, Saturday, May 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

Visitors walk around the Museum of Survivors, located in a factory where Oskar Schindler saved some 1200 Jews during WWII, in Brnenec, Czech Republic, Saturday, May 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

A visitor takes a photo at the Museum of Survivors, located in a factory where Oskar Schindler saved some 1200 Jews during WWII, in Brnenec, Czech Republic, Saturday, May 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

SAN FRANCISCO DE YARE, Venezuela (AP) — As Diógenes Angulo was freed Saturday from a Venezuelan prison after a year and five months, he, his mother and his aunt trembled and struggled for words. Nearby, at least a dozen other families hoped for similar reunions.

Angulo’s release came on the third day that families had gathered outside prisons in the capital, Caracas, and other communities hoping to see loved ones walk out after Venezuela's government pledged to free what it described as a significant number of prisoners. Members of Venezuela’s political opposition, activists, journalists and soldiers were among the detainees that families hoped would be released.

Angulo was detained two days before the 2024 presidential election after he posted a video of an opposition demonstration in Barinas, the home state of the late President Hugo Chávez. He was 17 at the time.

“Thank God, I’m going to enjoy my family again,” he told The Associated Press, adding that others still detained “are well” and have high hopes of being released soon. His faith, he said, gave him the strength to keep going during his detention.

Minutes after he was freed, the now 19-year-old learned former President Nicolás Maduro had been captured by U.S. forces Jan. 3 in a nighttime raid in Caracas.

Venezuela's government on Thursday pledged to free a significant number of prisoners in what it described as a gesture to “seek peace.” Officials have not identified or given a number of prisoners being considered for release, leaving rights groups scouring for hints of information and families to watch the hours tick by with no word.

U.S. President Donald Trump said the release of people detained for political reasons came at Washington’s request.

"Venezuela has started the process, in a BIG WAY, of releasing their political prisoners," Trump wrote Saturday on his Truth Social platform. “Thank you! I hope those prisoners will remember how lucky they got that the USA came along and did what had to be done.”

Trump added that should prisoners forget, “it will not be good for them.”

As of Saturday night, only 16 people imprisoned for political reasons had been released, according to Foro Penal, a Venezuelan advocacy group for prisoners. Eight hundred and four remained imprisoned, the group said.

A brother of human rights attorney Rocío San Miguel, one of the first to be released and who immediately relocated to Spain, said in a statement that her release “is not full freedom, but rather a precautionary measure substituting deprivation of liberty.” The conditions of her release ban her from speaking to the media.

“This situation does not constitute exile, nor a waiver of her rights, but is part of the humanitarian and diplomatic agreements reached to facilitate her release,” José Manuel San Miguel said of his sister's move to Spain.

Among the prominent members of the country’s political opposition who were detained after the 2024 presidential elections and remain in prison are former lawmaker Freddy Superlano and Perkins Rocha, lawyer for opposition leader María Corina Machado. Juan Pablo Guanipa, a former governor and one of Machado's closest allies, and Rafael Tudares, the son-in-law of opposition presidential candidate Edmundo González, also remain imprisoned.

One week after the U.S. military intervention in Caracas, Venezuelans aligned with the government marched in several cities across the country demanding the return of Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores. The pair were captured and transferred to the U.S., where they face charges including conspiracy to commit narco-terrorism. Both pleaded not guilty.

In Caracas, many demonstrators waved Venezuelan flags and chanted, “Maduro, keep on going, the people are rising.”

Acting president Delcy Rodríguez, speaking at a public social-sector event in Caracas, again condemned the U.S. military action on Saturday.

“There is a government, that of President Nicolás Maduro, and I have the responsibility to take charge while his kidnapping lasts ... We will not stop condemning the criminal aggression,” she said, referring to Maduro’s ousting.

After the shocking military action that overthrew Maduro, Trump stated the U.S. would “run” the South American country and demanded access to oil resources, which he promised to use “to benefit the people” of both nations.

“I love the Venezuelan people and I am already making Venezuela prosperous and safe again,” Trump said in his Saturday post.

The U.S. and Venezuelan governments on Friday announced they are evaluating the restoration of diplomatic relations, broken since 2019, and the reopening of their respective diplomatic missions. A U.S. delegation visited Venezuela for several hours Friday.

Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yván Gil responded to Pope Leo XIV's statement Friday calling for maintaining peace and “respecting the will of the Venezuelan people.”

“With respect for the Holy Father and his spiritual authority, Venezuela reaffirms that it is a country that builds, works, and defends its sovereignty with peace and dignity,” Gil said in a social media post, inviting the pontiff “to get to know this reality more closely.”

Relatives and friends of political prisoners hold candles calling for their loved ones to be set free outside the Rodeo I prison in Guatire, Venezuela, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026 after the government announced prisoners would be released. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Mariana Gonzalez, the daughter of opposition leader Edmundo Gonzalez, whose husband is detained, waits outside the Rodeo I prison in Guatire, Venezuela, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026, after National Assembly President Jorge Rodriguez said the government would release Venezuelan and foreign prisoners. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Relatives and friends of political prisoners hold banners calling for their loved ones to be set free outside El Helicoide, the headquarters of Venezuela's intelligence service and detention center, in Caracas, Venezuela, Friday, Jan. 9, 2026 after the government announced prisoners would be released.(AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)

Police patrol near El Helicoide, headquarters of Venezuela's intelligence service and a detention center, in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026.(AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Narwin Gil cries as she waits for news of her detained sister, Marylyn Gil, outside El Helicoide, headquarters of Venezuela's intelligence service and a detention center, in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

Police patrol near El Helicoide, headquarters of Venezuela's intelligence service and a detention center, in Caracas, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026.(AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

A relative embraces Diogenes Angulo after his release from prison in San Francisco de Yare, Venezuela, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. Angulo had been detained two days before the 2024 presidential election. (AP Photo/Ariana Cubillos)