ZGram - 7/13/2002 - "Are the Wiesenthalers running out of snitches?"

irimland@zundelsite.org irimland@zundelsite.org
Sat, 13 Jul 2002 16:57:02 -0700


ZGram - Where Truth is Destiny

7/13/2002 -

Good Morning from the Zundelsite:

A news item that speaks for itself!

[START]

BBC News, Friday, 12 July, 2002, 14:45 GMT 15:45 UK

Lithuania offended by Nazi hunters' reward

An offer by the Simon Wiesenthal Centre to provide $10,000 rewards 
for information about former Nazi collaborators in Lithuania has 
stirred strong passions in the Lithuanian press.

The centre has accused Lithuania more than once of an inability or 
unwillingness to try people suspected of collaboration with the Nazis.

The magazine Veidas takes offence, warning that the offer suggests 
Lithuanians are consciously hiding Nazi collaborators, and that only 
money would persuade them to reveal the names of persons who took 
part in the genocide.

"Obviously, this attitude hurts the pride of the Lithuanian people 
and it could start polluting the atmosphere in Lithuanian-Jewish 
relations and arousing mutual mistrust," the magazine warns.

"One must not forget that... the Nazis also used similar means to 
find Jews who were in hiding," Veidas concluded.

In countries as far afield as Britain and Australia, Lithuanians have 
found themselves on trial, accused of helping the Nazis round up and 
kill Jews during World War II.

There have only been two attempts to try war criminals in Lithuania, 
both of which were called off on the grounds that the defendants were 
too ill to stand trial.

The newspaper Kauno Diena warns that "any lawyer would agree that a 
great deal of information received in such cases is not only useless 
but also misleading".

"Will people's evidence be reliable? Is it possible to remember 
precisely enough things that happened 60 years ago? Moreover, as 
people are now ready to go to court over a small plot of land and 
families are torn apart by conflicts over property, only God knows 
what they might start saying about each other for $10,000," the paper 
goes on.

It also notes that the head of the Jerusalem branch of the Simon 
Wiesenthal Centre, Dr Efraim Zuroff, has admitted that the likelihood 
of victims recognising their oppressors is very remote.

"The most valuable information may only be given by accomplices of 
the criminals. These would then be the people to get the reward, 
although accomplices should be tried in the same manner as actual 
murderers," Kauno Diena concludes.

[END]


(SOURCE: 
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/monitoring/media_reports/newsid_2124000/2124672.stm 
)