Le Soir, Belgium’s largest daily newspaper, asserted today that Josef Mengele, the long-hunted “selection doctor” of the Auschwitz death camp, was in hiding in North Paraguay under the protection of one of the most influential army officers of the regime.
According to the report, Mengele entered Paraguay from Buenos Aires in October 1958 and in 1959 he received Paraguayan nationality though he had not been a resident of the country for five years as required by law. Immediately on arrival in Asuncion, the report said, he was taken under the protection of Robert Jung, a businessman who made it his aim, immediately after the collapse of Hitler’s Germany, to settle former Nazis in Paraguay.
Mengele mixed freely with various circles in Asuncion until 1960 when Adolf Eichmann was seized and brought to Israel. From that time on Mengele was a wanted man. However, he was not believed to be in immediate threat of arrest because his extradition might be difficult in view of his present nationality.
It was also indicated that Mengele might be involved in smuggling activities exposure of which could compromise men in high military position and that he was protected by the “Cuchiolleros,” men armed with knives who protect the security of military chiefs and smugglers. Mengele’s security was portrayed as being finally dependent on the continuation of the Stroesser dictatorship in Paraguay.
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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.
