Prime Minister K. U. von Hassel, of the State of Schleswig-Holstein, today defended his Government in the Schleswig-Holstein Parliament here against accusations of neo-nazism. He rejected charges voiced by Social Democratic deputies who accused his Government of “freeing the way for return of important Nazis to high positions in the Government administration and Judiciary.”
The Social Democrats specifically mentioned former Nazi Deputy Minister of Justice Franz Schlegerberger, who is receiving a Government pension, although he had been convicted of war crimes at Nuremberg in 1947; Professor Werner Heyde, practicing medicine although proven as a doctor who practiced euthanasia on concentration camp victims under the Nazi regime; Dr. Herta Oberhauser, another physician engaged in similar activities on behalf of the Nazis; and Ernst Lautz, formerly a chief prosecutor under the Nazi regime.
In the cases of all these people, Premier von Hassel said, the Government has “acted correctly.” He declared that his Government “condemns everything that was brutal in the Nazi system,” but insisted “we do not want anything that would lead to a second denazification.” “My Government” he stated, “would support the prosecution of Nazi criminals, but the independence of the judiciary must be maintained.” The Social Democrats in the State Parliament said, after Mr. von Hassel’s address, that he “evaded the real issue.”
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