Accused Nazi war criminal Jozef Schwammberger, ordered extradited from Argentina, will be handed over to West German authorities on May 3, according to Manuel Tenenbaum, director of the Latin American Branch of the World Jewish Congress.
Tenenbaum received his information from the Argentine Justice Ministry and conveyed it to Elan Steinberg, executive director of the WJC, which is headquartered here.
Schwammberger, 78, will be handed over to officials of the West German state of Baden-Wurtemberg. He is to stand, trial for war crimes in Stuttgart, West Germany, for the killings of at least 5,000 Jews while he was commandant of the concentration camps at Przemysl and Mielec in Poland in 1943-44.
The Argentine Supreme Court decided last month to uphold West Germany’s extradition order, filed in 1973 by a court in Stuttgart.
Schwammberger was arrested Nov. 13, 1987, in Cordoba province, Argentina, where he had been hiding.
He was arrested one month after the Simon Wiesenthal Center held a new conference that publicized Schwammberger as its No. 1 “most wanted” Nazi war criminal. His photograph was circulated in the Argentine media.
“This represents the first time ever that Argentina has ever extradited a Nazi war criminal,” said Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Wiesenthal Center. “It’s a positive indication that Argentina will look into other cases.”
The cooperation of the West German authorities was called “excellent” by Elliott Welles, director of the Task Force on Nazi War Criminals of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith.
Welles cited the $290,000 posted by the state of Baden-Wurtemberg. The reward was paid to an unidentified party.
Cooper said the West German government has over 50 eyewitnesses to Schwammberger’s crimes. “He was unique because he was both a bureaucrat and a hands-on murderer,” Cooper said.
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