The court of assizes here is reported to be considering whether to call West German Chancellor Kurt George Kiesinger as a defense witness in the trial of Adolf Beckerle, the German Minister in Sofia, Bulgaria, during World War II, who is being tried as an accessory to the murder of more than 11,000 Jews.
The victims were deported from Bulgaria to the Treblinka death camp in Poland in 1943. It is the contention of Beckerle, whose trial opened last November, that when he participated in the deportations, he was unaware of the fate that awaited the Jews. Dr. Kiesinger, who was deputy leader of the radio department of the Nazi Foreign Ministry in charge of propaganda and counter-propaganda, is believed to be the only witness who can bear out the defendant’s claim that the Sofia legation was not on the mailing list for Foreign Ministry documents. Those documents kept Nazi diplomatic missions abroad informed of the policy to annihilate the Jews. Kiesinger’s testimony has been demanded by Beckerle’s defense counsel. But the court is yet to act on his demand.
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.
