An entire nation stopped its daily routine for two minutes on Monday.

Drivers stopped their cars on crowded highways and got out to stand quietly on the street as mourning sirens wailed throughout Israel, as they do every year, to mark Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Here in Seoul, too, far away from the Middle East, the Israeli Embassy and about 100 guests including some two dozen foreign envoys held a silence to remember the 6 million Jews systematically murdered during World War II by Nazi Germany, at the Israel Culture Center in southern Seoul on Monday.

“Being a son of Holocaust survivors, it is important for me to increase awareness of the most terrible tragedy in human history,” said Israeli Ambassador to Korea Tuvia Israeli in a speech during the event.

This year’s observance of the Holocaust by the Israeli Embassy here was particularly special because of the opening of the first Holocaust Museum in Korea in Busan, as a part of the larger Israeli culture center there, Israel House.

“In this context I would like to congratulate Keum and Jay Kronish and to thank them for opening the first Holocaust Museum in Korea as part of the ‘Israel House’ in Busan,” Israeli said.

Israeli said the embassy is organizing the participation of Korean educators and spiritual leaders in a dedicated seminar in Jerusalem at the International School for Holocaust Studies, or “Yad Vashem.”

By Philip Iglauer (ephilip2011@heraldcorp.com)