Dr. Albrecht Ganzenmueller, 68, former State Secretary In Hitler’s Transport Ministry, went on trial today in Dusseldorf for his alleged participation in sending millions of Jews to the gas chambers of Auschwitz, Treblinka, Sobibor, Belzek and Lublin from July 1942 on. Ganzenmueller has been described as the archetype of the Nazi “desk murderer.”
The Dusseldorf Public Prosecutor will seek to prove that Ganzenmueller, in his capacity as Dep- uty Director General of the Reich Railways, was guilty of providing thousands of freight cars to transport Jews to the Nazi extermination camps. Ganzenmueller denies knowing for what purpose the cars were used. He has pleaded not guilty to abetting murder in more than one million cases.
Recent research by Wolfgang Scheffler, the West Berlin historian, indicates that at least 1,750,000 were exterminated at Treblinka, Belzec and Sobibor alone. About one million Jews were murdered at Auschwitz. About 120 witnesses will be called to give evidence against Ganzenmueller. Preliminary investigations have been going on for years, and it is impossible to say when the trial will end. A tentative date has been set at six months.
The daily transportation of Jews to Treblinka, and later to other camps, began on July 22, 1942 Many Jews packed into small cars died of thirst, hunger and heat on the long journey east. Most of the SS officers at these camps have been sentenced to prison terms in West Germany, Poland and elsewhere.
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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.
