The West German Cabinet gave formal approval today to the law which was passed by the West German Parliament last week to provide payment of indemnities to individual victims of Nazis.
The law, which will become effective in October, was adopted on the basis of an agreement reached between the West German Government and the Conference of Jewish Material Claims Against Germany. It provides for the payment, over a period of nine years, of about $1,000,000,000 in German currency to persons who suffered under the Nazi regime.
Eligible for indemnification under the new law are persons who suffered bodily injury, loss of liberty, loss of property and deprivation of professional careers because of race, religion and political beliefs. It is assumed that more than half of the persons entitled to compensation under this law are Jews.
(In London, the United Restitution Office issued a statement today terming the West German indemnification law as “not fair and inappropriate” in some of its provisions. Organizations which have been sponsoring the United Restitution Office since its inception have approached the Conference on Jewish Material Claims with a request that it assume financial responsibility for the URO budget out of the German reparations funds.)
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