A. Rationale
While the necessity of bringing those who committed the crimes
of the Holocaust to justice is patently obvious, the practical
difficulties of achieving this goal are becoming increasingly difficult
as time goes on. Although there are at least many thousands of
individuals who actively participated in the implementation of
the Final Solution who have never been prosecuted for their crimes,
the chances of their being held accountable are rapidly diminishing
due to several obvious factors:
| 1. |
the advanced age of
the suspects |
| 2. |
the advanced age of the potential
witnesses (survivors, bystanders, and/or fellow perpetrators) |
| 3. |
the difficulty in obtaining credible
witnesses for crimes which were committed many years ago, often
in remote and/or inaccessible locations chosen to insure secrecy |
| 4. |
the lack of political will to prosecute
local Nazi collaborators in numerous post-Communist societies |
| 5. |
the lack of political will to prosecute
immigrant Holocaust perpetrators in some of the countries of
refuge |
Under these circumstances, the Simon Wiesenthal Center decided about
eighteen months ago that special innovative methods were required
to maximize the efforts to bring Nazi war criminals to justice. In
July 2002, therefore, the Center – together with the Targum
Shlishi Foundation of Miami, founded by Aryeh Rubin, who conceived
of this project – officially launched “Operation: Last
Chance,” a special program designed and coordinated by its
Israel director Dr. Efraim Zuroff, which offers financial rewards
to informants with evidence and/or information which can facilitate
the prosecution and conviction of Holocaust perpetrators. As a first
step, the Center decided to launch “Operation: Last Chance” in
the Baltics.
B. Why “Operation: Last Chance” Was Initially
Launched in the Baltics?
There are numerous reasons why the Baltics were chosen as the
first place to implement “Operation: Last Chance.” While several
relate to the specific nature of the events of the Holocaust in Lithuania,
Latvia and Estonia, others were a product of practical and technical considerations.
The most important are the following:
| 1. |
These countries had
the highest victimology rate in Europe during the Holocaust.
Not only were the local Jewish communities almost completely
annihilated, but many thousands of Jews from other countries
(Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and France) were
deported to the Baltics and murdered in Lithuania, Latvia,
and Estonia. |
| 2. |
The extremely large number of local
collaborators who actively participated in the mass murder
of the local Jewish communities and Jews deported to these
countries. |
| 3. |
The fact that local police units
from each of the Baltic countries were sent abroad, where they
actively participated in the mass murder of Jews (especially
in Belarus and Poland.) |
| 4. |
Following the occupation of the
Baltics by the Soviet Union in 1944, many Nazi war criminals
were prosecuted and convicted by the Soviet authorities. These
individuals can testify regarding crimes committed during the
Holocaust that they personally witnessed without fear of prosecution. |
| 5. |
The fact that there has not been
a single prosecution of a local Nazi war criminal – in
which the defendant was healthy enough to attend the trial
and bear punishment if convicted – in any of the three
Baltic countries since regained independence in 1991, makes
the efforts to bring the guilty to justice of unique significance
for Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian society. |
| 6. |
With all three countries on the
verge of membership in NATO and the European Union, and the
European Union, there will be special interest in the attitude
of the Baltic republics to this important subject. |
C. Implementation
In July 2002, the Wiesenthal Center officially launched “Operation:
Last Chance” in Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia with press
conferences in Vilnius (July 8), Tallinn (July 10) and Riga (July
11). At the press conferences, the Center announced its willingness
to pay ten thousand U.S. dollars ($10,000) to anyone who would
provide information which would lead to the prosecution and punishment
of a Nazi war criminal. These press conferences were followed by
imaginative ads which publicized the reward offer, while highlighting
the active participation of local Nazi collaborators in the mass
murder of the Jewish community.
D. Results To Date
During the initial year and a half of “Operation:
Last Chance,” the Center received the names of a total of
two hundred and fifty-six suspected Nazi war criminals according
to the following breakdown by country of origin:
| Lithuania |
196 names |
| Latvia |
41 names |
| Ukraine |
13 names |
| Estonia |
6 names |
Each of the names and all of the accompanying information were
investigated by the Center to evaluate their validity and relevance.
At the end of this process, the names of fifty-five of the suspects
were submitted to local prosecutors as worthy of further investigation,
according to the following breakdown by country of origin:
| Lithuania |
44 names |
| Ukraine |
13 names |
| Latvia |
13 names |
In the wake of the launching of “Operation: Last Chance” and
the submission of the names of the suspects to local prosecutors,
eight official murder investigations have already been opened in
Lithuania by Special Prosecutor Rimvydas Valentukevicius against
approximately three dozen suspects and we expect additional investigations
to be initiated elsewhere. Several of the suspects identified escaped
many years ago to other countries such as the United States (at
least 15 suspects), Canada and Sweden
E. Expansion of “Operation: Last Chance”
Given the encouraging results achieved in the Baltics, the Center
decided last summer to expand the project to several additional European
countries. Thus in the fall of 2003, “Operation: Last Chance” was
launched in Poland, Romania and Austria. The reasons these countries
were chosen is as follows:
a. Poland
As the site of all six Nazi death camps, Poland was the country
in which the majority of European Jewry were murdered by the Germans
and their collaborators during the Holocaust. In addition millions
of non-Jewish Poles were persecuted and murdered during the Nazi
occupation.
Under these circumstances, it is only natural for the Wiesenthal
Center to initiate “Operation: Last Chance” in Poland
in order to help facilitate the prosecution of those responsible
for Nazi crimes during World War II.
In that context, it is important to note the important work already
being done by the Institute of National Memory under the leadership
of its president Prof. Dr. Leon Kieres. Since the establishment of
the Institute, Poland has made significant progress in the investigation
and prosecution of Nazi war criminals, especially in comparison to
other post-Communist and post-Soviet countries. Thus the conviction
in 2001 of Henryk Mania for crimes committed at the Chelmno death
camp and the recent investigation of the murder of the Jews of Jedwabne
are concrete examples of the existence of political will in Warsaw
to investigate the cases of Holocaust perpetrators and bring them
to justice, and the ability of the Institute to do so successfully.
The Center expects to work together with the Institute to help maximize
the prosecution of Nazi war criminals and is hopeful that the results
achieved by “Operation: Last Chance” in Poland will expedite
the efforts of the Institute. To help achieve those goals, the Center
has maintained close cooperation with Prof. Dr. Kieres and his staff
and hopes that this cooperation will be enhanced by the successful
implementation of “Operation: Last Chance” in Poland.
b. Romania
During World War II Romania was a satellite state of Nazi Germany
and actively participated in the implementation of the Final Solution
in Romania and in the territories it annexed, as well as in the Ukraine.
In fact, the Romanian government under Marshal Ion Antonescu played
a leading role in the mass murder of Romanian Jews, and tens of thousands
of Jews in the Ukraine.
Despite the active complicity of Romanians in the crimes of the
Holocaust, Romania has had considerable difficulty in facing its
World War II past, as clearly evidenced by the following facts:
| 1. |
Not a single Holocaust
perpetrator has been investigated, let alone prosecuted, in post-Communist
Romania; |
| 2. |
The lack of a special unit to
investigate and prosecute such cases; |
| 3. |
The numerous instances of the
commemoration and glorification of fascist Romanian leader Marshal
Antonescu who committed terrible crimes against civilians, primarily
Jews, during his rule as leader of Romania during World War II; |
| 4. |
Recent comments by prominent Romanian
leaders and officials, including President Ion Iliescu, minimizing
the severity and scope of the crimes of the Holocaust and the
complicity of Romanians in these crimes. |
Under these circumstances, the Wiesenthal Center believes that the
implementation of “Operation: Last Chance” in Romania
can have a beneficial effect both in terms of facilitating the prosecution
of Holocaust perpetrators and the sensitizing of Romanian public
opinion regarding the severity of the crimes committed by Romanians
during World War II.
c. Austria
While Austria has made considerable progress in facing its Holocaust
history during the past two decades, one major area in which it has
been terribly deficient has been the investigation and prosecution
of Nazi war criminals. Despite the existence of numerous Austrians
who actively participated in the implementation of the Final Solution,
not a single Austrian has been convicted of Holocaust crimes during
the past quarter of a century.
Austria’s failure in this respect has been reinforced by recent
research carried out the Wiesenthal Center which has shown that numerous
Austrians served in German police battalions which committed the
mass murder of civilians, primarily Jews, in Eastern Europe during
the years 1939-1944. (The research in question was carried out in
conjunction with German Labor Ministry by the Center’s researcher
Dr. Stefan Klemp as a part of a project designed to cancel the special
disability pensions of individuals who violated the norms of humanity,
in accordance with a law passed by the Bundestag in January 1998.)
Under these circumstances, the Center hopes that the launching of “Operation:
Last Chance” in Austria will help facilitate the investigation
and prosecution of Austrian Holocaust perpetrators, and educate the
Austrian public regarding the important role played by numerous Austrians
in the implementation of the Final Solution.
F. Implementation and Results
The project is still in its initial stages in Poland, Romania and
Austria. Initial press conferences were held with the participation
of local Jewish leaders in Warsaw (September 10), Bucharest (September
12) and Vienna (September 15) and special “hotlines” have
already been installed in Austria and Romania. Our ad campaign was
initiated in Austria in December and will be launched in Romania
and Poland in March.
To date we have received the names of more than a dozen suspects
in these countries but until the ad campaigns are launched and completed,
we will not be in a position to gauge the success of the operation
G. Future Expansion of “Operation: Last Chance”
During the coming six months, we plan to launch the project in Hungary,
Croatia, the Ukraine and Germany and possibly in Belarus. Depending
on our fundraising efforts, we are also considering initiating it
in several South American countries known as havens for escaped Nazi
war criminals (Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Paraguay).
H. Conclusion
During the past three years (2001-2003), more than two-dozen Nazi
war criminals have been convicted in six different countries all
over the world. During 2002, the United States alone filed ten new
indictments against Holocaust perpetrators. These statistics clearly
prove that it is still possible – even in 2004 – to bring
Nazi war criminals to justice, but time is rapidly running out, which
is the primary reason why “Operation: Last Chance” is
so important.
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