May 2


OHIO:

Demjanjuk returns to courtroom -- This time his fight is with ex-supporter


Composed and walking slowly, John Demjanjuk went to court Monday in a
bitter fight against one of his biggest supporters.

Jerome Brentar sued the family of the Seven Hills man for $2 million,
seeking reimbursement for helping Demjanjuk's defense against allegations
that he was a Nazi sentry.

Demjanjuk's family contended that Brentar only wanted to further his
neo-Nazi views of the Holocaust and that there was never an agreement to
repay him..

The case is the latest legal fight for Demjanjuk, who is appealing a
deportation order by a federal immi gration judge. The judge ruled in
December that the 86-year-old retired autoworker worked at three
concentration camps during World War II and lied about his past.

In a rare courtroom appearance, Demjanjuk needed help to stand and sit
down.

He talked briefly to his son, John Jr., and his former son-in-law, Edward
Nishnic, who were in last-minute settlement negotiations that failed.

He never left the side of his wife, Vera, often holding her hand.

Brentar testified in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court that he made 26
trips to Europe in the 1980s to prove Demjanjuk innocent, racking up tens
of thousands of dollars in expenses. He said the Soviets framed the former
autoworker, using a forged guard pass, something he realized because of
his experience with the International Refugee Organization, when he read
thousands of German documents.

"It looked phony to me," Brentar said. U.S. judges have ruled that the
card was authentic.

Brentar's attorney, Robert Boyd, said Demjanjuk and his wife urged Brentar
to help in the case, and they promised they would repay him. In the
courtroom, Demjanjuk smiled at the description and shook his head silently
from side to side.

Demjanjuk was extradicted to Israel, charged and sentenced to death. The
Israeli Supreme Court overturned the conviction in 1993, and he returned
home. Brentar said he helped save Demjanjuk's life.

But Demjanjuk's attorney, Kenneth Boukis, told jurors that Brentar was one
of dozens of volunteers who helped the family. The family now questions
Brentar's motives, saying they believe he tried to further his agenda as a
Holocaust revisionist, or a person who believes the Nazi atrocities
against Jews didn't happen.

"Brentar's views are part of a larger anti-Semitic motive and movement,"
Boukis said in documents.

Boukis wants to present a great deal of evidence linking Brentar to the
revisionist movement, which Brentar's attorney, Boyd, has fought. Judge
Timothy McGinty said he would rule later in the trial. Brentar has said he
is not anti-Semitic.

"We're not here to relive World War II," McGinty said.

(source: Cleveland Plain Dealer)





AUSTRIA:

Nazi Convictions Triple


In Vienna, the Simon Wiesenthal Center says that though Nazi suspects are
now too old to prosecute, convictions of Nazi war criminals are three
times higher than in 2005.

However, the Center criticized some countries for not investigating or
prosecuting suspected war criminals within their borders.

The Jewish group said that the convictions rose by 320 percent in the past
year.

(source: All Headline News)






FRANCE:

Holocaust Museum to Help France Trace Jews


French authorities will get help from the U.S. Holocaust Museum in
tracing Jews and others held in the French camp at Rivesaltes in
World War II, under an agreement signed Monday at the museum.

More than 2,300 Jews among as many as 8,000 men, women and children held
at the camp were later sent to Auschwitz, French Ambassador Jean-David
Levitte said at the signing ceremony.

Rivesaltes, in the Pyrenees mountains near the Spanish border, was one of
an estimated 31 camps where Jewish refugees were held in France. Barracks
at the camp, which earlier housed refugees from the Spanish Civil War, are
being restored as a memorial. The agreement was signed by Christian
Bourquin, president of the general council of the Department of
Pyrenees-Orientales, the local authority.

A data base is also being set up.

Radu Ioanid, in charge of international archives at the museum, said it
would put French authorities in touch with 256 survivors of Rivesaltes,
who could help with information on others who were interned there. He
praised the cooperation of French officials in memorializing Jewish
victims of the Nazis.

More help to the data base may come from the expected opening of German
concentration camp archives held by the International Tracing Service at
Bad Arolsen, Germany. The German government announced last month that it
is ready to work with the United States, which along with France and
others, has urged access for historians. The 11 governments concerned will
meet in Luxembourg May 16 in an attempt to get agreement on the opening.

(source: Associated Press)






ENGLAND:

Family to be paid for art stolen by Nazis


The British government will give the family of a Czechoslovakian doctor
more than $315,000 for art stolen by Nazi's and sold to the British Museum.

A special panel to determine how to deal with goods stolen during the Nazi
genocide and now housed in Britain made the determination, the BBC
reports.

Dr. Arthur Feldmann and his wife were killed during the Nazi invasion and
the art was taken from them.

His grandson, Uri Peled, now living in Israel, said the museum could keep
the drawings because that is what his grandfather would have wanted.

The three drawings by Niccolo dell'Abbate, Nicholas Blakely and Martin
Schmidt were purchased by the museum in a 1946 Sotheby's auction.

David Lammy, Britain's culture minister, said other proposals by the Nazi
theft panel will be made public for comment.

"I am currently taking expert advice on how to bring forward legislation
to help put right these historic wrongs," he said.

(source: United Press International)