Oświęcim County

Oświęcim County (Pol. powiat oświęcimski) is one of 19 land counties of Lesser Poland Voivodeship. Geographically the county is one of the smallest in size, its area is 406.1 km² with the population of over 153,000, the population density is 377.6 p/km². The county's administrative seat is Oświęcim. Oświęcim County came into being on January 1, 1999 as a result of an administrative reform.

It is considered to be one of the most ill-famed counties of Lesser Poland Voivodeship and Poland, in general. Here during the period of 1940-1945 one of the bloodiest concentration camps of World War II, "Auschwitz-Birkenau", also regarded as a symbol of The Holocaust, functioned. This is the only concentration camp that was enlisted into the UNESCO's World Heritage list. During the war period more than 1.3 million people were exiled; 1.1 million of them died in "Auschwitz-Birkenau". Almost 90% of tortured to death were Jewish, that equals to 960,000 people. Among other exiled nationalities were: Polish, Romanians, Ukrainians, Russians etc. Today on the territory of concentration camp there is a memorial ;museum, which has become the centre of nostalgic tourism of Lesser Poland Voivodeship.