The Bundesrat, the upper house of the West German Parliament approved this weekend a final indemnification bill previously passed by the Bundestag providing a fund of 1,200,000,000 deutschemarks ($300,000,000) for the compensation of those Nazi victims who were unable to file claims by the October 1, 1953 deadline because they were in Iron Curtain countries.
West German President Heinrich Luebke is now expected to sign the measure into law and it will probably come into effect this month. The measure was first opposed by the Bundestag but was given approval by a mediation committee of the two houses of the Bonn Parliament.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
