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The chief Nazi hunter of the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center on Sunday
dismissed as "pure fantasy" claims by a former Israeli colonel that he had participated in the execution
of the notorious Nazi war criminal Dr. Aribert Heim in
the United States two and a half decades ago.
The unsubstantiated claims that Heim was killed are made in Not Forgotten or
Forgiven; On the trail of the last Nazi, a book by former
Israel Air Force colonel Danny Baz, slated to be published
in France this week. Heim, who is known as the notorious "Dr Death," is wanted for the murder of hundreds of inmates of the infamous Mauthausen concentration
camp in Austria, and is the second most wanted Nazi criminal
in the world.
"There is ample evidence
that clearly shows that Dr. Heim was alive long after he
was supposedly executed," said Dr. Efraim Zuroff, the center's Israel director. "In fact, there is every indication that he is still alive today, and for that
reason, the search for his whereabouts continues."
Zuroff said there was a €310,000
award being offered by the German government, the Wiesenthal
Center and the Austrian government for information which
will lead to Heim's arrest and prosecution by the German
government.
Baz asserts in his book that he
was involved in the hunt by a covert American group called "The Owl," which he said found Heim in Canada and took him to the island of Santa Catalina,
off the California coast near Los Angeles, where he was "tried and executed." The Austrian-born Heim, who would be 93 today, fled Germany in 1962 after Austrian
police began investigating him, and has been reported living
in various parts of the world, including Latin America
and Europe, as recently as two years ago.
Heim is second on the list of
top wanted Nazi war criminals issued by the Simon Wiesenthal
Center, just behind the most wanted Nazi criminal Alois
Brunner, Adolf Eichmann's top assistant, who is thought
to be in Syria if still alive.
Paris-based Nazi hunter Serge
Klarsfeld said Sunday that the book was "a total fantasy" and "completely crazy," adding that it was likely a publicity stunt for fame or money.
He said both Heim and Brunner
have already died of natural causes.
In contrast, the Wiesenthal Center's
2007 "most wanted" Nazi lists states there is "strong evidence" that Heim is still alive.
Zuroff said a €1 million bank
account in his name is active in Berlin, which Heim's children
could have received if they proved he is dead.
A German police task force is
convinced the Heim is indeed alive even as his whereabouts
are unknown, Zuroff said.
jpost.com
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