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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE
© 1972, The
Beate Klarsfeld Foundation
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On February 19 the court found that it had no
jurisdiction, and I took the case to the Paris Court of Appeals. Four months
later, on June 18, 1968, that court sustained the lower court's opinion and
sent my case back to OFA's arbitration committee. I was in a somewhat
Kafkaesque situation, now that appearing before OFA's arbitration committee was
the only course open to me.
In order for the committee to challenge
Walter Hailer, the German judge, I would have to ask him to disqualify himself.
I did so. I also wrote the French judge, the other member of the committee,
asking him to declare his German colleague unqualified for this hearing. That
desperately wily move ended with Walter Hailer being challenged in September
1968. Consequently the OFA became involved in a slow reorganization of its
administrative procedure that resulted in a change in its constitution, for
since there was no provision for a substitute judge, one had to be made in my
case.
I had involved myself in a very complicated legal battle that set
some precedents. La Gazette du Palais dealt at length with the case from
the point of view of international conventions and jurisdictional immunity.
The French Yearbook of International Law twice, in 1969 and 1970,
reviewed my case and its numerous implications, especially in respect to a
civil servant's right to continue in his employment. It turned out that I had
to fight on familiar ground. Any evasion or giving up would have meant
repudiating my first contentions, and I could not bring myself to do that.
In September 1967, soon after my dismissal, I had written to the German
Minister of Justice Gustav Heinemann, who was later to become President of the
Federal Republic. Heinemann promised to look into my case. I was to follow his
good advice more literally than he thought, for on December 8, 1967, his
Secretary of Justice, Horst Ehmke, wrote me:
I have been too busy with other matters to
be able to study your case earlier. I do not know the outcome of the suit you
brought before the French court on November 27, but I imagine the court will
send the case back to the OFA committee in accordance with Article 23 of the
OFA constitution. On the other hand, you should not expect much from a plea
before an arbitration board in Germany. If, however, you wish to pursue such a
course, be very cautious and choose your lawyers with the greatest of care.
My personal opinion is that an attempt to
demonstrate the political
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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE
© 1972, The
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