Oct. 24



GERMANY:

The Nazi-hunting Simon Wiesenthal Center will begin a campaign in January
to flush out the last surviving Nazi war criminals in Germany, the head of
the center's Jerusalem office said Sunday.

Efraim Zuroff said the campaign will finally begin after several delays on
January 27, the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz
concentration camp in Poland.

The campaign is part of the Jewish group's ``Operation Last Chance,'' a
drive which has been underway across eastern Europe to catch World War II
criminals who took part in the Holocaust.

The center is racing against time as both the perpetrators and survivors
of war crimes grow old and die. Zuroff told Reuters last year there was a
``window of opportunity'' of three to five more years to catch Nazi
criminals.

The center planned to offer $12,630 for information leading to prosecution
of Nazi war criminals, Zuroff said.

He said it was difficult to estimate how many suspected war criminals were
still at large. But he believed that it could number in the thousands.

``It's difficult to estimate but there's no question in my mind that at
least several dozen people could be prosecuted,'' Zuroff said.

``The key is the testimony of fellow perpetrators and that is very
difficult to achieve,'' he added.

Britain this year awarded an honorary knighthood to Simon Wiesenthal, who
is in his nineties, for ``a lifetime of service to humanity'' pursuing
Holocaust perpetrators.

He spent the best part of five decades tracking down more than 1,000 Nazi
war criminals responsible for the mass murder of Jews and played a role in
the capture of Adolf Eichmann, in charge of the deportation of million of
Jews to death camps.

(source: Reuters)