Jewish Delegation May Accompany Austrian Chancellor to London Peace Meeting

Asserting that he believes the Austrian Government is inclined to grant some of the Jewish demands on restitution of property, David Brill, president of the Vienna Jewish Community, stated yesterday that he may head a four-man Jewish delegation to accompany Chancellor Leopold Figl to the Foreign Ministers’ Deputies peace treaty meeting in London if the government also accedes to other Jewish demands.

The demands include: 1. The return of former Jewish apartments; 2. The immediate return, under the restitution laws, of all confiscated Jewish property and business licenses, the retroactive payment of all pensions to Jews, which were cancelled by the Nazis, and the refunding of all special taxes which the Nazis levied on the Jews; and 3. The creation of an heirless Jewish property fund, administered by the Jews under state control.

If this fund is insufficient to provide adequate relief and rehabilitation assistance for Jewish survivors, it should be supplemented by state funds, the Jewish Community proposes. It suggests that the state could obtain such funds from fines imposed on Nazis under the Austrian denazification laws.

The current issue of Neue Weg, organ of the Jewish Community, declares that except for minor measures, the Austrian Government has not yet instituted a system of property restitution. It charges that “Nazi thieves still have everything, while their victims live under the same conditions as existed during the Nazi regime.” It adds that it is “no wonder that Austria is described as an anti-Semitic country abroad.”