The
historian and author Stefan Klemp presented his book titled
“KZ-Arzt Aribert Heim – Die Geschichte einer Fahndung” (Concentration
Camp Surgeon Aribert Heim – Chronology of a Search) to the
Berlin public last Friday. In his publication, Klemp gives
details on the search for the former concentration camp surgeon
who kept escaping arrest successfully and whose alleged death
in the early 1990s has not been verified to this day. Gathering
evidence for his book, Klemp also sifted through the documentation
of the International Tracing Service (ITS) at Bad Arolsen.
The ITS archive keeps a copy of the operations’ record from
Concentration Camp Mauthausen signed by Heim in his own hand.
This record is the most important authentic source in the
cause of Aribert Heim.
Between 8th October and 30th November 1941, Heim affixed his signature to a total
of 268 surgeries registered in the operations’
record. The atrocious and brutal surgery methods
which he applied and which ended the lives
of innumerable concentration camp inmates brought
him the epithets “Doctor Death” and “Butcher
of Mauthausen”. After the war, the Austrian
national lives in Germany – a man of integrity.
He opens a surgery, marries and produces offspring,
plays ice hockey, and he gets the German citizenship.
It is not before September 1962 that a warrant
is issued for his arrest which Heim is warned
about, though, hurrying to leave the country.
Since
then, Heim has been considered to be one of
the most wanted Nazi criminals. Clues or indications
of his alleged stay in Egypt or South America
unfailingly emerged at regular intervals. One
of the last attempts to locate him was made
by the second German public service television
channel (ZDF). In collaboration with the “New
York Times”, its correspondents found out that
Heim had died in Cairo in 1992, apparently.
Klemp’s book focuses on the history of the
febrile long-term search for Heim over decades
on the one hand and on the numerous efforts
made to cover all traces and prevent the seizure
of the Nazi perpetrator on the other hand.
“Plenty of questions remain unsolved”, regrets
the author who has played an active part in
the past years’ search for Heim on behalf of
the Simon-Wiesenthal Centre. “The case has
not yet been settled.”
its-arolsen.org
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