U.S. lawmakers want to force Holocaust-era insurance companies to disclose lists of their insured to Holocaust survivors. The Holocaust Insurance Accountability Act of 2007, introduced by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), seeks to supersede international agreements brokered by the State Department to settle insurance claims through the International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims.
The proposed legislation asserts that ICHEIC, which officially ends its 9-year efforts this week, “did not make sufficient effort to investigate” or compile the names of Holocaust-era insureds or the claims due to survivors. The measure would require insurers to disclose comprehensive lists of those they insured during the Hitler era. The legislation also authorizes federal lawsuits to recover monies from insurers, thus overruling ICHEIC’s authority, and a variety of adverse Supreme Court rulings that have denied survivors the right to sue.
The bill was spurred by survivors groups following revelations in the Jewish media that the secret International Tracing Service archive in Bad Arolsen, Germany, contains thousands of uninvestigated documents relating to insurance and corporate complicity.
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