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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE
© 1972, The
Beate Klarsfeld Foundation
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The communists did nothing. The Düsseldorf
Deutsche Volkszeitung, for which I wrote regularly, did not publish my
piece on Achenbach. East Germany kept silent. And although I paid a call on the
Tass Agency in Paris, I found it equally unenthusiastic. Achenbach, a prominent
big business lawyer, represented powerful outlets in the East. Once again
governmental interests were in conflict with morality.
How was I to
break so many dikes that this affair would overflow onto the international
scene? What had been published in Paris on April 7 was sufficient reason for
going into action. In Bonn, Walter Scheel stated: "The press will probably make
a big fuss about this affair for a couple of weeks, and then no one will hear
any more about it." The single AFP dispatch was not enough. Consequently we
substituted wide geographical coverage for further news releases. I telegraphed
for an interview on the 9th with Joseph Luns, the Netherlands' Foreign
Minister; Gaston Eykens, the Belgian Prime Minister; and Jean Rey, president of
the European Committee; and on the 10th with Conrad Ahlers, the German
government spokesman.
Consequently, within twenty-four hours, all press
dispatches from Holland, Belgium, and Germany carried the same news: "Hostile
Reaction to Achenbach Due to Disclosure of His Nazi Past." European newspapers
got three dispatches on the same topic on the same day. They decided, with such
excitment [sic] over the Achenbach affair in three capitals simultaneously,
they would give the story some prominence.
Late in the evening of
Tuesday, April 7, I landed at Schiphol airport. Television crews and a number
of reporters were waiting for me. I talked freely in German about the purpose
of my visit, which was to give the Dutch government the facts about Achenbach
as well as my personal opinion of him, and I had an opportunity to show the
television audience some actual documents. The scene appeared on the late news
that night, and on the following day as well.
I spent the night with a
couple of reporters in an Amsterdam suburb, and at 9 A.M. I presented myself at
the Foreign Ministry. Luns's chief of staff received me. He told me that the
Dutch Foreign Minister was having an interview with the son of Tunisian
President Habib Bourguiba, but that if I could wait, he would see me. I had no
time, however. I had to take the eleven o'clock train
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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE
© 1972, The
Beate Klarsfeld Foundation |
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Page 102 |
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