Top Nazi war crimes suspect Laszlo Csatary denied all allegations against him
at a first hearing before prosecutors in Hungary on Tuesday.
Top Nazi war crimes suspect Laszlo Csatary, who is accused of overseeing the
deportation of thousands of Jews to their deaths during World
War II, denied all allegations against him at a first hearing
before prosecutors in Hungary on Tuesday, his lawyer said.
"Csatary denied all allegations against him," his attorney, Horvath, told journalists after a three-hour closed-door hearing.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center has said
that Csatary, 97, is responsible for organizing the deportation
of approximately 16,000 Jews from the ghetto of Kosice in
present-day southeast Slovakia to their deaths in Ukraine
and to the gas chambers at the Auschwitz extermination camp.
Tuesday's hearing was aimed at enabling
prosecutors to lay out their evidence against Csatary, who
was arrested earlier this month after apparently living for
years undisturbed in Hungary.
No formal charges have yet been filed
against Csatary, who is now under house arrest.
"He denied being an anti-Semite
before, during and after the events of Kassa, (the Hungarian
name for Kosice)," Horvath said.
Following the hearing, Csatary was
led away in a car after Tuesday's hearing, his face hidden
under a blanket.
"Much of the hearing dealt
with his alleged anti-Semitism, which he denied, citing examples
within his family and his circle of friends," Horvath added.
Csatary also denied he was ever the
commander of the Jewish ghetto of Kosice, which was then
part of Nazi-allied Hungary, or that he had ever signed any
documents in that capacity, Horvath said.
Last week, a historian from Hungary's
Holocaust museum said several documents dealing with the
deportations bore Csatary's signature.
However, Horvath said Csatary could "easily
be mistaken for someone else".
The next step against Csatary is unclear,
the lawyer said, noting there had been no mention at the
hearing of a possible extradition procedure.
At the time of Cstary’s arrest, Efraim
Zuroff, director the of the Simone Wiesenthal urged authorities
to bring Csatary to justice as quickly as possible, saying, "This is the debt owed to his many victims who were tortured and sent to be murdered
at Auschwitz."
"The passage of time does
not diminish the guilt of the killers and old age should
not afford protection to the perpetrators of Holocaust crimes," Zuroff added. israelnationalnews.com
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