Aegis Trust

Aegis Trust, founded in 2000, is the leading British NGO which campaigns to prevent genocide worldwide. Based at the United Kingdom’s Holocaust Centre, which opened in 1995, the Aegis Trust coordinates the UK Genocide Prevention All-Party Parliamentary Group , funds the Genocide Prevention Group and is responsible for the Kigali Memorial Centre in Rwanda, which commemorates the 1994 genocide and is central to education of a new generation about the dangers of ethnic division.

The word Aegis means 'Shield' or 'Protection', reflecting the need to protect vulnerable people against genocide. Since late 2004, Aegis has been among the organisations at the forefront of research, campaigning and policy development in the United Kingdom's response to the Darfur crisis.

Origins: The Holocaust Centre

The Aegis Trust was founded by brothers James and Stephen Smith, as a progression from their establishment of Beth Shalom, the UK Holocaust Memorial Centre. They had no personal connection with the Holocaust, but simply felt that whatever your ethnicity or religion, the fact people could commit mass murder should challenge you – ideally in formative years, within the education system.

Within a few years of opening, the Holocaust Centre was internationally recognised as a place of remembrance and education, with hundreds of schoolchildren daily visiting the permanent exhibition and memorial gardens, meeting survivors of the Holocaust and hearing their personal stories. Today it also...
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