THE world-renowned Anne Frank Exhibition, which is due to be opened officially in Worcester Cathedral tomorrow, promises to be a moving start to the new year.

The story of teenager Anne, how she hid from the Nazis in Amsterdam and kept a diary of her day-by-day existence until her Jewish family was captured and taken to the death camps, has given generations since the Second World War an insight into the horrors of persecution.

And, just as those previous generations have come face-to-face with the Holocaust through her words, so school pupils from across Worcestershire who visit the exhibition will face challenging questions about tolerance, human rights and democracy today.

The exhibition promises to encourage visitors to think about then and now, to see the parallels and differences.

Importantly, it aims to show how any attempt to organise society on the basis of the idea of a superior or pure race, religion or ethnic group leads to intolerance, with those who do not conform to the ideal being discriminated against, persecuted and sometimes even murdered.

We'd urge all who can to visit the exhibition, and consider carefully its message that a society which respects differences between people does not arise by chance. As well as having laws to defend and protect the weak and vulnerable, all of its citizens should be committed to the principles behind those laws.