Vandals in Poland have defaced a monument marking the mass murder of hundreds of Jews during World War Two.

Police Thursday said the vandals used green paint to draw swastikas and write racist inscriptions on the walls of the monument, located in the town of Jedwabne .

The monument honors the victims of the 1941 massacre, in which more than 300 Jews were shut in a barn and burned alive by their Polish neighbors.

Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski condemned the attack on the memorial, saying there is no place for such acts in the country, even if committed by just a small group of extremists.

Police say they discovered the vandalism during a routine patrol on Wednesday.

Poland was home to pre-war Europe's largest Jewish community.