A new probe into Auschwitz crimes threatens to open old wounds
Around 500 Auschwitz survivors are to be interviewed after the Polish government
re-opened an investigation into the atrocities committed
there during World War II in the search for potential war
criminals.
The Krakow branch of the Institute
of National Remembrance in Poland (Instytut Pamięci Narodowej,
IPN), which investigates both Nazi and Communist crimes,
announced the new probe at the end of October. The aim will
be to ascertain whether any former Auschwitz staff are still
alive, and if so, whether to pursue legal action against
them.
The news agency Associated Press reports
that the new investigation had been prompted by the successful
trial and conviction of a Nazi war criminal living in the
United States. John Demjanjuk was prosecuted in Germany earlier
this year, and found guilty of more than 28,000 counts of
accessory to murder. The case was unique, because Germany
had never before prosecuted a camp guard on the assumption
that by working at a Nazi camp during World War II, they
shared culpability for the murders that took place there.
Efraim Zuroff, a Nazi hunter working
with the Simon Wiesenthal Center, told AP that he welcomed
the news of the new investigation. But, he also said that
the results were not a foregone conclusion.
Mr Zuroff added: “The Institute of
National Remembrance excels in opening up investigations.
They don’t excel in prosecuting Nazi war criminals.”
Although trials of Auschwitz staff
were officially halted in 1956, following an international
amnesty, the new programme is actually a continuation of
another investigation begun under the Communist regime in
Poland but shelved with the collapse of the Iron Curtain.
An individual prosecution was last brought in Poland in 2001,
when Henryk Mania was jailed for eight years for his role
in genocide at Chelmno.
Piotr Piatek, of Krakow IPN, confirmed
that new cases could be brought to court. He told the Polish
Press Agency: “We cannot exclude the possibility that someone
from the staff of Auschwitz-Birkenau is still alive, in which
case, he would be responsible for crimes against the state.”
Polish Radio reports that the investigation
will delve into the daily organisation of camp life. The
IPN also hopes to reach a final figure for the number of
people who died at Auschwitz.
The announcement of the investigation
marks the anniversary of Auschwitz becoming a fully-operational
death camp, in October 1941. A new book looking at the Holocaust,
also published to mark the anniversary, claims that there
was effectively a ‘Europe-wide’ collaboration with the Nazis.
Professor Dan Stone’s book Histories
of the Holocaust, published by Oxford University Press, draws
on research from across Europe, to paint a picture of the
Holocaust as a ‘European project.’
Prof. Stone, who works at the Royal
Holloway, University of London and heads the UK’s Holocaust
Research Centre, pointed out the ‘systematic, state-level
collaboration’ in France, Norway and the Netherlands. He
wrote: “It has become clear that the murder of the Jews in
Eastern Europe would have been much harder for the Germans
to carry out were it not for the assistance of the local
inhabitants throughout Europe. And, the same is true in Western
Europe.”
krakowpost.com
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