The federal government decided yesterday to present to Parliament a supplementary budget of 1.95 billion Marks, of which 50 million Marks will go to the New York-based Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany as the first part of a find financial gesture toward Jewish victims of Nazism.
Under an agreement worked out by the three factions in Parliament, the total sum of reparations in the framework of the final restitution would be 440 million Marks, but it is not known yet when the additional awards of 390 million Marks will be made available.
Observers here say that the debate in the Bundestag over the supplementary budget – most of which covers new international commitments will take place sometime toward the end of May. if endorsed by Parliament, the money for reparations could probably be paid out at the end of summer.
Last December the parties represented in the Bundestag agreed upon a sum of 240 million Marks to be made available during 1980, of which 200 million Marks would go to the Claims Conference and 40 million Marks to the Jewish community in the Federal Republic. Under the some agreement additional sums of 100 million Marks would be paid out in each of the years 1982 and 1983.
MAJOR BUDGETARY PROBLEMS
But major budgetary problems have changed the original plans. Officials here could not say exactly which course the government will follow in the final gesture, but they pointed out that the important thing is that there is a start.
No problems are expected in mobilizing support for the additional reparations among members of Parliament. But some of them – mainly in the Christian Democratic opposition faction – would like to link the debate on the issue with financial claims of former civil servants of the Hitler era who were never cleared by the de-Nazification tribunals.
The final reparations will cover the financial claims of Jewish victims of the Holocaust who were not in a position to forward their demands on time to benefit from the original reparation agreement. Most of these Jewish survivors lived in East European countries when the deadline for filing claims expired.
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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.
