Wanted Nazi charged with murder of 430,000 Jews
One of the world's most wanted Nazi suspects has been charged in Germany with the murder of 430,000 Jews at a concentration camp.
Former guard Samuel Kunz, 88, had been living undisturbed for decades at his home near Bonn when he received a letter saying he had been charged. Goeke in Dortmund said.
Kunz, who is third on the Simon Wiesenthal Centre's list of most-wanted Nazi suspects, had long been ignored by the German justice system, partly due to a lack of past interest in going after relatively low-ranking camp guards.
But in the past 10 years a younger generation of German prosecutors has emerged interested in bringing all surviving Nazi suspects to justice.
The Wiesenthal Centre's most wanted is Sandor Kepiro, a former Hungarian gendarmerie officer accused of involvement in the deaths of 1,200 civilians in Serbia, while second on the list is Milivoj Asner, who served as police chief in Croatia during the war. He now lives in Austria, which has refused to extradite him to Croatia on medical grounds.
While Kunz ranked fairly low in the Nazi hierarchy, he is among the top most wanted due to the large number of Jews he is accused of having been involved in killing - which the prosecutor's office in Dortmund puts at 430,000.
The highest-profile example of guards facing trial is the case against John Demjanjuk, the 90-year-old retired car worker being tried in Munich for accessory to the murder of 28,060 Jews as a guard at the Sobibor death camp in occupied Poland.
Kunz's case came to light because of Demjanjuk.
Authorities recently stumbled over it when they studied old documents from German post-war trials about the SS training camp Trawniki in connection with the trial of John Demjanjuk.
Kunz's charges include participation in the murder of 430,000 Jews at the Belzec death camp in occupied Poland, where he allegedly served as a guard from January 1942 to July 1943, as well as murder over "personal excesses" in which he allegedly shot a total of 10 Jews in two other incidents
Kunz still lives at home and was not detained because officials who interviewed him think that he will not try to flee the country, a person familiar with the case said.
Kunz, an ethnic German, was born in August 1921 on Russia's Volga River.
As a soldier with the Soviet Red Army during the Second World War he was captured by the Germans and given the choice of either staying at the Chelm prisoner of war camp or co-operating with the Nazis.
After the war, he moved to Bonn, worked for many years at a federal ministry and was granted German citizenship.
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Samuel Cassar
Jul 30th 2010, 19:50
430,000, single-handedly? He must've been THE Terminator ("I'll be back! (in 65 years' time)) Hehe...I've read better jokes... http://www.rense.com/general69/dim.htm
GiovDeMartino
Jul 30th 2010, 14:53
"65 years undetected!" ONLY in Malta!!!!!!!!!!!!Pajjiz tal-M MOuse qal Johnnie!
Charles Sammut
Jul 29th 2010, 17:33
Without any shadow of doubt, war crimes should be punished severely to dissuade others.
However, the principle must be applied with equal vigour to all, irrespective of race, nationality, religion or political orientation.
Will the US be held accountable for its war crimes in Vietnam? Its unjustified invasion to find non-existent WMD in Iraq and which has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people? The debacle in Afghanistan as evidenced by the mass leakage of 90,000 secret files on Wikileaks detailing indiscriminate civilian killings and targetted assasinations? Will the Simon Wiesenthal Centre be as diligent in its quest for justice and investigate Israel's horrific war crimes against the Palestinians in Gaza?
Would one be justified to think that this story has been conjured up to divert attention from some of the events I mentioned. Yes, the persecution of various minorities, among them Jews during WWII is to be condemned, but equally condemnable is the never-ending exploitation by Jews, of those few years of sad history for ulterior motives and to justify their own mis-treatment and expulsion of Palestinians in the occupied lands.
Jesmond Micallef
Jul 29th 2010, 18:45
I agree with you.
I tend to think that wrongs find solace in other wrongs and ask what's happening to the difference between right and wrong. Is this difference getting ever so smaller with time, most especially after the communications revolution brought about by the internet and so on..?
There are also other aspects to this, like "passing on the buck", for exmple. The truth is allways one and if people don't like or love it then ..........??
O Farrugia
Jul 30th 2010, 12:09
Well said Mr Sammut! The last paragraph shows how ironic this person's life turned out. Serving your country as a soldier, being caught as a POW and being given that choice, if you can call it a choice! The true face of fascist dictatorship!
The US/Afghanistan/Iraq reminds me of Syria-Lebanon case. Yet I find some point of contention with the case of the Jews vs Palestinians. Their situation started after the second world war, by a completely different war. I personally think that the Palestinians should be aided by whoever got them into this mess in the first place! The Arab World coalition against the British Empire's decision to create a Jewish state. In the time of true whole Palestine they lived in the same space territory with their own troubles of diversity just like every other country. Why did all the other Arab countries have to interfere? It was a Palestine issue. After the second world war, yes, the Jewish strategies against persecution became just insuperable. Jews fled to Israel in thousands from all over the world to fight off the Arabs and the Arab Coalition failed. Who would fight the Israelis now?
Jesmond Micallef
Jul 30th 2010, 13:25
To collect humans from all over europe in a systematic order and to exterminate them like poultry still upsets alot of stomachs right to this day. This fact gave the nation of Israel a place on the world map. Technology was used in a very systematic order but indeed technology such as nuclear weaponry will prevent this from happening again. A potential that all the world has to live with, whether the world likes it or not.
Peace : If I could only believe it really exists.
Richard Scotto
Jul 29th 2010, 14:59
This animal(with all apologies to animals) should not die a natural death!
Jesmond Micallef
Jul 29th 2010, 12:26
The entity called josef mengele (apparently a "herr doktor") managed to keep clear from prosecution. It could have experimented with members of its own famly in order to consolidate further the scientific aspects of human emotion. This entity legged it when it started feeling the emotion of fear !! Apparently it returned to its fatherland on a couple of occasions before it died. Usually such stunts are well organised with the help of other entities.
Such entities belong in permanent public exhibition for people to see for themselves that not every "doktor of supposedly high culture and intellect" had successfully developed holistically.
This entity called "herr kunz" here should be put on public display. A notice attached to its neck could indicate species and genetic make up, for the make benefit of the scientific community.
Mario Caruana
Jul 29th 2010, 02:49
think... 430000.. almost as many as the whole Maltese population.
Lawrence cardona
Jul 29th 2010, 01:15
After all these years i don't think this is justice no matter what everyone says i belive that the truth is never said 100% so if justice was not made then now it's to late now within 40 years start taking people to court on what is being done or had been done in iraq afganistan etc etc and why not how about the war of vietnam this is insane justice late justice denide so let those who died passes away pray for them and let god judge and to those new in power look around youo i think you have lot to do now then waking up the dead i'm against what you are doing
Kevin J Drake
Jul 29th 2010, 01:03
The spirit of justice plays very weird games indeed, but always seems to hit the nail on the head, as it were, sooner or later. Jews the world over rejoice at the news of yet another inhuman barbarian, responsible for the Shoach, being brought to justice. Remember. Remember. Remember. So that such unfathomable atrocities never reoccur. Baruch Atta Adonai Eloheynu.
Steve Borg
Jul 28th 2010, 23:03
Hopefully this scum-bag faces justice, albeit some sixty five years late. What a sadist. Imagine the children he killed, the hopes he crushed, the futures he reaped. Now who was it who said that the holocaust was a big fat lie?
s.koludrovic
Jul 28th 2010, 22:19
Now what should we all say, better late than never.
For goodness sake this SOB managed to live for 65 years undetected for the crimes he commited.
Nizar Hingari
Jul 28th 2010, 20:06
Mans inhumanity to man... hope this kind of atrocity never happens again..