The election of Herman Klenner, a Nazi party member during World War II, as vice president of the United Nations Human Rights Commission headquartered here, was forcefully denounced by Israel’s Ambassador to the UN in Geneva, Efraim Dubek. Klenner heads the East German delegation to the Human Rights Commission annual conference, which opened yesterday.
Dubek called his election by the conference a demonstration of the “political cynicism and moral degradation prevailing in this international body.” He added that the elevation of an ex-Nazi to the vice presidency of the Commission “questions the credibility and efficacy of the Commission’s work in the field of human rights.”
The Israeli envoy noted that Klenner joined the Nazi party on April 20, 1944 and was issued card No. 97-56-141. Dubek found it morally objectionable in 1984 that a card-holding Nazi should head his country’s delegation to the Human Rights conference, and spoke out against it at the time. But Klenner again headed the East German delegation to the conference in 1985 and now as well.
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.
