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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE
© 1972, The
Beate Klarsfeld Foundation
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acquittal, would naturally cause public opinion in
Germany to accuse the French courts of having wrongly sentenced "German
patriots." That would be all the more likely as German society does not
consider them criminals, because they have been living quietly since 1945. The
rehabilitation of these criminals can only disgrace Germany. It is one step
more in the direction of an indulgent attitude toward Nazism in Europe as a
whole that would distort all spiritual and moral values. There is no
reconciliation possible with a totalitarian world. It would result only in an
acceptance of Nazi values. German society must be forced into self examination,
however painful that may be.
I told all of this to Yaron London, the
Israeli television correspondent in France, when he interviewed me shortly
after my return from Prague. He asked:
"Who are the most responsible
for Nazi crimes in France who are still unpunished?"
"The two most
important are Kurt Lischka and Herbert Hagen."
"Where are they?"
"Living quietly in Germany."
"Where?"
"Lischka, the top
police official in France, lives in Cologne. When I was studying his record I
found that he had been chief of the Cologne Gestapo from January to November
1940. I thought that if he were still alive he might well have chosen to live
in a city where his former employees and associates had found jobs on the
police force and in the local government. I asked German telephone information
whether there was a Kurt Lischka listed in the Cologne directory. A few minutes
later I got the answer: 'Yes, there is a Kurt Lischka. His number is
631–725. His address is 554 Bergisch-Gladbacher Strasse.'"
"So it
was as easy as that!"
"Yes. It's only in detective stories that Nazis
live a hunted life, quivering in far-off Patagonia every time a door squeaks.
Aside from the Eichmann case, which was undertaken and executed by official
branches of the Israeli government, there has never been any extralegal action
taken against Nazi criminals. Israel acted with a legality that everyone had to
acknowledge. In spite of that, there was a flood of protests against the
illegality of seizing Eichmann."
"Still, what can private initiative
accomplish?"
"The activities of Wiesenthal, Langbein, and anti-fascist
organizations in the Federal Republic are leading to trials of the
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WHEREVER THEY MAY BE
© 1972, The
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