Two ex-Nazi concentration camp guards charged in Germany
Wiesenthal Center locates 18 survivors of Stutthof to assist in trial
By TAMARA ZIEVEA Nazi parade in Berlin(photo credit: Wikimedia Commons)
An indictment has been filed in Muenster, Germany, against two guards who worked at the Stutthof concentration camp near Gdansk, Poland.The state prosecutor’s office in the western city of Dortmund said the two unnamed suspects, ages 92 and 93, participated in murders committed by the Nazis, according to a statement released by the regional court in nearby Muenster.“With their actions during their time as guards at the Stutthof concentration camp, the accused are believed to have been accessories in numerous killings,” the statement said.The 92-year-old suspect was stationed at Stutthof between June 1944 and May 1945, while the 93-year-old acted as a guard between June 1942 and September 1944.The Muenster court said that both suspects have denied involvement in the deaths at Stutthof.In accordance with prosecution policy adopted in Germany several years ago, any person who served in any capacity in deaths camps or in killing squads can be convicted on the basis of service alone, without having to prove they committed any specific crimes.A statement issued by The Simon Wiesenthal Center’s chief Nazi-hunter, Dr. Efraim Zuroff, noted the importance of the final efforts to bring Holocaust perpetrators to justice, and congratulated the German prosecutors on their efforts in the case.“During the past four months, the Wiesenthal Center has located 18 survivors of Stutthof, most of whom currently live in Israel, to assist the preparations for the trial of the Stutthof guards,” Zuroff said. “Other survivors were located in the United States and Sweden. These survivors were primarily Jews from Lithuanian ghettos and Hungarian Jews who had initially been deported to Auschwitz. Approximately 110,000 Jews and non-Jews were deported to Stutthof and about 85,000 were murdered there. In 1943, a gas chamber was built there to facilitate the last stages of the ‘Final Solution.’ We urge anyone with information regarding Stutthof survivors to contact us as soon as possible.”
