Jewish Claims Conference Protests to Germany on Indemnification

The Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany submitted a strong protest to the president of the German Bundesrat, the upper chamber of the Bonn Parliament, which currently is granting consideration to the Third Implementing Regulation to the Federal Indemnification Law for the benefit of Nazi victims.

More than one-fourth of the one million claims presently on file at German indemnification offices demand damages springing from injuries to employment and the interruption of careers in business and the professions, and hence will fall under the provisions of the proposed regulation.

The Claims Conference explained that the yardstick for the payment of economic damages under the Federal Indemnification Law, was intended to be the difference between earned income and income which would have accrued in the absence of Nazi persecution. The implementing regulation, however, fixes the standards for income which would have accrued, at levels so low that many thousands of Nazi victims who suffered economic losses will be stripped completely of all benefits, or the compensation they will receive will be grossly disproportionate to the losses sustained.

Great numbers of Nazi victims would also be deprived of annuities for economic damage to which they were entitled. The Claims Conference urged upon the Bundesrat to accept the recommendations it had previously submitted to that body. The recommendations differ sharply from the terms of the proposed regulation which, the Conference stated, is in violation of the letter and spirit of the Federal Indemnification Law.