The Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial and museum in Poland has urged visitors not to balance on the rails that were used to transport Jews to be murdered.

Authorities at the museum at the former Nazi concentration and extermination camp made the plea on social media, sharing several pictures of people balanced on the train rails like tightrope walkers.

“When you come to @AuschwitzMuseum remember you are at the site where over one million people were killed. Respect their memory,” the message read.

The museum spokesman said there were better places to “work on one’s balance than the site which symbolises deportation of hundreds of thousands to their deaths.”

A record 2.15 million people visited the museum in 2018, about 50,000 more than in the previous best-visited year, 2017.