A history of the notorious Nazi death camp
May 20th, 1940: Auschwitz I is founded in an old Polish army barracks which later served as the administrative centre for the whole complex. It was the site of the deaths of around 70,000 Polish intellectuals and Soviet prisoners of war.
June 14th, 1940: the first transport of Polish political prisoners from Tarnow arrives at Auschwitz. Among the 728 Poles there were a number of Jews. The entrance to Auschwitz I is marked with the sign in German saying Arbeit Macht Frei (work makes you free).
September 3rd, 1941: first victims gassed to death in Auschwitz using Zyklon-B are 600 Soviet prisoners of war and 250 Jews from the infirmary.
October 1941: Auschwitz II, or Birkenau, which could accommodate over 100,000 inmates opens. The entire complex contained three camps and at least 36 sub-camps which were built on an isolated 40 sq km (15 sq mile) site.(Auschwitz III supplied forced-labour for the nearby I.G. Farben plant.)
January 1942: four large gas chambers added to Auschwitz camp, three more extermination camps opened to step up killings.
January 1942: senior Nazis meet at the Wannsee conference to co-ordinate the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question" and to agree a definition of "Jew".
March-June 1943: New crematoria put into operation at Auschwitz-Birkenau capable of disposing of 6,000 bodies a day.
November-December 1944: Germans dismantle, bury and plant over Auschwitz's gas chambers and crematoria.
January 1945: Auschwitz evacuated as the Soviet Red Army advances, many prisoners killed in camp, 58,000 compelled to leave and most die during forced march.
January 27th, 1945: Red Army soldiers enter Auschwitz and free the remaining 7,000 prisoners.
Between May 1940 and January 1945: 1.2 to 1.5 million people died at the camps, of whom about 1 million were Jewish. About 200,000 inmates survived.
Out of about 7,000 guards at Auschwitz, including 170 female staff, 750 were prosecuted and punished once Nazi Germany was defeated.
Sources: Reuters/Oxford Companion to the Second World War/BBC