Vienna (dpa) - Nazi war crime suspect
Milivoj Asner is unfit to stand trial, an Austrian court
spokesman confirmed Thursday.
The court had hired a German expert to give a second opinion on a contentious
previous verdict by local psychiatrists that the 96-year
old Asner was suffering from dementia.
Asner, who has lived in Austria for
decades, is listed as number three among the most wanted
war criminals by the Simon Wiesenthal Centre in Jerusalem.
The Croatia-born suspect, who lives
in the southern Austrian town of Klagenfurt, was examined
by the Munich forensic psychiatrist Norbert Nedopil.
Earlier tests by Austrian experts
had found Asner to suffer from dementia, a diagnosis which
had been challenged by the Wiesenthal Centre after Asner
appeared appeared well and lucid in an interview with the
British daily Sun last summer.
"He is unfit for interrogation
or trial," said Norbert Jenny, the spokesman of the Klagenfurt court.
Croatia has requested Asner's extradition,
as he is suspected of having helped to deport Jews, Roma
and Serbs to World War II concentration camps.
One of the previous examiners, Reinhard
Haller, has told German Press Agency dpa that it is common
for demented people to appear lucid about some aspects of
their past while not being able to remember what they did
in the previous hours.
Asner's case echoes that of the Wiesenthal
Centre's most wanted Nazi suspect John Demjanjuk. The 89-year-old
alleged Nazi death camp guard is fighting his extradition
from the United States to Germany for health reasons.
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