Rene Pousquet, former Undersecretary of State for office in the Vichy Government, who was charged with responsibility for the persecution and death of thousands of French Jews during war, was deprived of his civil rights for five years for five years today by a Paris court, but the sentence was immediately suspended because the court found that the defendant, although serving as a Vichyite official, had secretly rendered service to the resistance movement.
Denying the charges made against him, Posquet insisted in court that he saved any Jews during his term in office and that when he took over the administration of tie police there were 7,000 Jews in Jails and camps, but that he freed 4,000 of them. declared that he was opposed to racist laws and only obeyed orders from the Interior Ministry.
Referring to his support of- the Nazi race laws, he said: "I supported them as a rope supports a hanged man." He also claimed that he refused to prosecute a priest who publicly protested against the order forcing Jews to wear clothes marked with a yellow Star of David.
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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.
