Riga, April 9-The Simon Wiesenthal Center today announced at a press conference
in the Latvian capital that it had already received the names
of some 37 suspected Latvian Holocaust perpetrators in response
to its "Operation:Last Chance," a project launched together with the Targum Shlishi Foundation of Miami, Florida,
which offered financial rewards for information which would
lead to the conviction and punishment of Baltic Nazi war criminals.
According to the Center's chief Nazi-hunter Dr. Efraim Zuroff,
who coordinates "Operation:Last Chance," the information came from 18 informants and relates to crimes which were committed
in various cities, towns, and villages all over Latvia. Although
several of the suspects were already dead, quite a few were
reported to be alive and these cases are currently being investigated
by the Center's researchers prior to their submission to the
Latvian prosecutors. Several of the suspects have escaped to
Sweden, Australia, Canada, and the United States.
" We are working against the clock and have to do whatever we can
to facilitate the investigation and prosecution of these cases. The information
received in the framework of "Operation:Last Chance" is information which otherwise would never have reached us and offers new possibilities
to facilitate the prosecution of Holocaust perpetrators who should have been
convicted and punished decades ago," said Zuroff, who has played an active role in tracking down Baltic Nazi war
criminals ever since Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia regained their independence
from the Soviet Union in 1991.
Zuroff noted that not a single Baltic Holocaust perpetrator had sat for even
one minute in jail since the Baltic countries had obtained independence and
called upon the local governments to exhibit the political will necessary to
mount such
trials. "Ultimately,
such legal proceedings could have a very positive effect on the willingness of
these societies to face their bloody Holocaust pasts. Given the fact that local
participation in Holocaust crimes in the Baltics was among the most extensive
in Europe the potential importance of such trials should not be minimized,” said Zuroff.
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