West Germany today demanded the arrest of the East German Minister for Industry, Eric Markowitch, for allegedly shooting Germans trying to escape to the West over the Berlin Wall. The charge enlivened the trial here, which opened 13 months ago, of leading personnel of the Auschwitz concentration camp, charged with murdering thousands of Jews.
Markowitch had come here to testify against some of the defendants. He had been a prisoner at Auschwitz, and told the court that more than 1,000 of the camp’s inmates were murdered in November and December of 1942 because they were no longer able to work. Hans Laterner, a member of the defense counsel, petitioned the court that he be arrested because he had ordered Germans to be shot while trying to escape over the Berlin wall. The chief Judge turned down that application, ruling the Berlin Wall issue had no bearing on the current trial.
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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.
