The Central Council of Jews in Germany has filed a strong protest with the Bonn Ministry of Finance, and also with the various individual states, against the official draft of the third implementation regulation to the Federal Indemnification Law for Nazi victims.
The implementation regulation in question deals with compensation for economic damage and for careers interrupted and cut short by Nazism. The methods proposed by the Federal Government for computing pensions and lump sum settlements are inequitable and lead to grossly unsatisfactory results, it was pointed out by the Jewish Central Council.
Only those over 65 years old or incapacitated to the extent of 50 percent are eligible for pensions. The Central Council explains that Nazi victims, who were employes at the onset of Nazi persecution, would in very many cases receive less, on the basis of the arithmetical formulae contained in the regulation, than even the $23. 80 that have been set by law as the monthly minimum pension. The way in which lump sum payments are arrived at is even more unfair, the Central Council noted.
The first two implementation regulations to the Federal Indemnification Law, which concern pensions for widows and orphans and compensation for those crippled by Nazi maltreatment, entered into effect in November. It is hoped that the long-overdue third regulation will soon be enacted, but that it will first be amended.
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