The release of convicted Nazi war criminal Pieter Menten yesterday, by order of a special tribunal of The Hague District Court, has been greeted by shock, surprise and anger here and abroad. Legal experts have criticized the decision as ill-considered and irresponsible.
Members of the various wartime Dutch resistance movements expressed outrage, as has Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal, who was interviewed in Vienna. So far, the Dutch media has not asked representatives of the Jewish community for comment. The Israel Embassy in The Hague has asked the authorities to re-arrest Menten to prevent him from leaving Holland.
(In Jerusalem today, Justice Minister Shmuel Tamir said Israel intends to renew its request to The Netherlands government for Menten’s extradition. The request was “frozen” when Menten was arrested two years ago and placed in detention pending trial. He was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment by an Amsterdam District Court last December for the mass murder of Jews and others in a Polish village during World War II when Menten served with the Nazi SS.)
Menten, a 79-year-old art dealer, described as a millionaire, was released from The Hague prison hospital yesterday on orders of the tribunal and his passport and all other possessions confiscated by the police were returned. He left the hospital in a car driven by his wife, Meta, for what was first described as an “unknown destination.”
Journalists learned later that he has gone to the fashionable Ursula Clinic, a psychiatric hospital in nearby Wassenaar, Menten, who personally appealed for release 10 days ago, showed no signs of psychiatric disorder. His confinement in the prison hospital was reportedly for treatment of diabetes.
Menten is apparently free to leave Holland One country he cannot enter is Switzerland where he fled two years ago to avoid arrest. The Swiss, who extradited him to Holland, regard Menten as an undesirable alien. Sharp questions are expected to be asked in the Dutch parliament over Menten’s release. Other countries too may seek his extradition but so far there has been no official reaction from Poland where his crimes were committed. Prof. Czeslaw Pilochowski, director of the Center for Nazi Crimes in Warsaw, has expressed shock at Menten’s release.
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