The Association of Jewish Invalids in Germany has appealed to the World Jewish Congress to intervene with the Bavarian Government against the freezing of all payments by the state Restitution Office, formerly headed by Dr. Philip Auerbach who is presently in jail facing charges of fraud. The memorandum points out that despite all appeals the office has made no cash payments nor has provided medical care for any of the victims of Nazism entitled to such payments or services since the Auerbach affair.
Bavarian Premier Hans Ehard, speaking in the State Parliament today, promised that the state of Bavaria would make every effort to carry out the payment of indemnification to victims of Nazism. He told the Parliament that since special funds allocated for indemnification payments had been exhausted and that the State’s financial position was difficult, further indemnification payments would have to depend on the sale by the Government of property confiscated from Nazis during the denazification proceedings.
The Premier, who replied to numerous questions on the indemnification program during a session of the legislative body devoted to marking the sixth anniversary of the liberation of prisoners from Nazi concentration camps, asserted that two-thirds of the entire restitution program in Bavaria had been carried out and that 12,000 indemnification cases had been settled. Since the German currency reform, he said, Bavaria had paid out 60,000,000 Deutechemarks to victims of the Nazi regime.
“Despite these enormous payments,” he added, “only a beginning has been made.” He declared the Government was now preparing a special ordinance providing for indemnification to those whose professional careers had suffered as a result of Nazi measures.
In a pointed reference to the activities of neo-Nazi organizations in the country, Premier Ehard said there were people trying to falsify history and the records of what had happened in the concentration camps. Anyone desecrating the remembrance of victims of Nazism, he warned, was also desecrating democracy and striking at the foundation of the State.
Dr. Georg Stang, President of the Parliament, in opening the session, assured victims of the Nazi regime that Parliament sincerely intended to rectify the injustices committed by the Nazis. He called on the people of Bavaria not to forget the horrors of the past.
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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.
