NEW YORK - United Nations information officers will be given lessons this week on the history of the Holocaust, it was announced Monday, continuing a trend by the world organization to recognize the mass murder of Jews during World War II.

Employees of the UN's public information department on Monday began a week-long program of discussion with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington under a program known as "Holocaust and UN outreach program."

The seminar in Washington dealt with the history of the Holocaust, which calls for confronting hatred, preventing genocide and cultivating moral responsibility.

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The UN General Assembly, dominated for decades by Arab and non-aligned countries bent on opposing Israel, had never recognized the Holocaust. That changed in January 2005 when it commemorated for the first time the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Nazi camps during the final months of World War II.

The 192-assembly then voted on programs of education for the UN on the Holocaust and the seminar in Washington was one of them. It also made January 27 a day for remembrance of the Holocaust.

"While providing participants with the historical background and context in which the Holocaust took place, the seminar will explore a number of themes central to the rise of the Nazis," the UN said in a statement. It said the themes included racist ideology, which led to the extermination of the Jews.

The attendees will also study the "moral obligation and responsibility" to protect human rights and preserve human dignity.

Six million Jews died at the hands of the Nazis, as part of the regime's "Final Solution" for the Jews of Europe.