Jan. 28



GERMANY:

DEATH SENTENCES IN THE LIVING ROOM----From Nazi Court to Posh Apartments


Hitler's military courts were notorious for their liberal use of the death
penalty. Now, a courthouse in Berlin where Nazi judges sentenced hundreds
of Third Reich dissidents to die has been converted to an apartment
building. Not everyone is happy about the switch.

The view from the loft apartments in the newly renovated apartment
building is as idyllic as it gets in Berlin: a lovely lake with ducks and
swans paddling about, all surrounded by vibrant green parkland. It's the
kind of place one doesn't often find just minutes from the heart of a
large city. No wonder interest in the building -- called "Atrion" -- has
been high.

But interest hasn't just been limited to potential tenants. Historians too
have taken note of the new residential paradise. The building, after all,
hasn't always been known as the "Atrion." From 1936 to the middle of World
War II, it housed one of Nazi Germany's notorious military courts. From
their bench in the building, Nazi judges sentenced over 1,400
conscientious objectors and resistance fighters to die, including members
of the well-known resistance group from the "Rote Kapelle" or Red
Orchestra.

"This project shows an incomprehensible forgetfulness on the part of both
Berlin and the country when it comes to the past," says Manfred Krause,
president of the Forum Justizgeschichte, a group specializing in the
misdeeds of Nazi courts.

Reign of Judicial Terror

The former courthouse has been divided up into 106 rentals, the most
expensive of which spreading out over 207 square meters (2,228 square
feet), complete with all the old relief work, ornamented windows,
plasterwork and vaulted ceilings. Many of the community rooms on the
ground floor have been lovingly brought back to life as well.

Of most concern, however, is the courtroom itself. It is here where Nazi
judges imposed a reign of judicial terror on all those seen as opposing
Hitler's megalomaniacal plans. It is here where the court handed down
dozens of death sentences against resistance fighters from the Rote
Kapelle -- a group of Berlin university students who not only distributed
anti-Nazi propaganda but also helped Jews escape the Nazi death machine.
Johannes Tuchel, head of the German Resistance Memorial Center --
dedicated to documenting anti-Nazi resistance prior to and during World
War II -- is unhappy about the current plan to transform the courtroom
into a common room for use by the building's tenants.

"It is inconceivable that this place, in which so many death sentences
were handed down, should be turned into a cozy space for relaxation,"
Tuchel says. Tuchel's group only learned about the building's planned
conversion into apartments until it was too late to stop it.

Thomas Groth, director of property management firm allod Immobilien GmbH,
which manages the building, has little patience for accusations that he is
part of a history cover-up. He points to the fact that as many details as
possible were kept true to the building's original appearance and the
outer faade, in keeping with the structure's protected status, remains
unchanged. "We wanted to keep as much as possible," Groth says.

Treason, Espionage and 'Undermining Military Morale'

He also points out that the former courtroom will be available for public
use as well -- hosting organized debates on the role of justice in the
Third Reich for example, or even for exhibitions. "We have treated this
space with the utmost respect, which is why we made the conscious decision
not to build apartments in it," Groth says. "The renovated courtroom will
be faithful to the original -- the only things we have removed are the
benches."

The building, with its neo-Baroque faade, was constructed between 1908 and
1910. And for most of its existence, it served the cause of justice --
first as a military court and then as an economic court before the Nazi
military began passing down harsh sentences on soldiers accused of
treason, espionage and "undermining military morale." Commemorative
plaques on and inside the building itself serve as a reminder of the Third
Reich period.

Once the war was over, the building was used to enforce the laws of the
new Federal Republic of Germany. But in 1997, it fell into disuse and
became a vast monument to history that few knew what to do with. "The
government is letting the former Nazi Military Court building fall into
ruin. Nazi history is being erased yet again," complained a Berlin group
in 2003.

The problem, however, was not that the government wanted history to
disappear. Rather, nobody quite knew what to do with the property. A plan
to convert it into a luxury hotel fell through in 2004. Meanwhile, the
Forum Justizgeschichte proved unable to rustle up the funds and support
necessary to turn it into a memorial center for victims of Nazi courts.
"We received polite and supportive responses from almost all of those
contacted, who nevertheless declined to back us up," recalls Krause. Even
the Berlin government admits that it was overwhelmed by both the
building's historical significance and its high price. Then, in 2005 a
private Dutch investment firm bought it from the federal government and
began renovation work in April 2006.

In other words, Groth likes to point out, turning the building into
living spaces is a vast improvement over the last decade of dilapidation.
"The building had naturally been affected by the length of time it lay
empty," Groth explains. "The fact that it had to be kept constantly heated
was costing taxpayers a fortune."

Serious Structural Damage

Berlin's state government agreed. The slow disintegration of the property
was a critical factor for Berlin officials as they considered whether to
allow the apartment project to go ahead. "Another decade standing empty
would have caused serious structural damage to the building," the Berlin
Senate responded to a query from a local politician.

Krause remains concerned about the lack of a centralized memorial center
dedicated to the victims of Nazi justice, though an exhibition "In the
Name of the German Volk -- Justice and National Socialism," housed in a
different Berlin court, takes up some of the slack.

But Groth sees things more pragmatically. "For about 80 years, justice in
its true sense was administered in this court. The building was only used
as a Nazi courthouse for about seven years, a relatively short time." In
any case, he continues, the tenants themselves -- 87 per cent of the
apartments are already let -- have no problems with the building's
history. "Only one potential tenant backed out for that specific reason."

(source: Der Spiegel)


*******************************



Jan. 25



SWEDEN:

Swedes Ponder Whether Killer Can Be a Doctor

The Karolinska Institute here is famed for choosing the winners
of the Nobel Prize in Medicine each year, and as one of the world's most
prestigious medical schools it rejects many students with the highest
grades.

Last summer, Karl Helge Hampus Svensson, 31, was among the 180 students
admitted to the freshman class after receiving top grades in high school
and courses he took online over the previous six years.

But last fall, institute officials received two anonymous letters claiming
that Mr. Svensson had been a Nazi sympathizer who was paroled from a
maximum-security prison after being convicted in 2000 of murder, a killing
the police called a hate crime.

After confirming the information, the institute had to decide: should Mr.
Svensson be allowed to become a doctor?

There was no legal way to expel Mr. Svensson, because "no national policy
covers the situation," Dr. Harriet Wallberg-Henriksson, the Karolinska's
president, said last month. The only grounds for expulsion would be if he
were a threat to others or had a psychiatric illness, she said.

Many doctors, students and officials argued that Mr. Svensson should never
get a license because of the trust needed in medicine; others said he had
served his time and should be permitted to stay and become a doctor.

On Thursday, after considering the case for months, the Karolinska
expelled Mr. Svensson on a technical issue: Mr. Svensson had apparently
falsified the name on his high school transcripts.

In re-examining his application forms recently, an institute official
noticed that Mr. Svensson's high school transcript, dated 1995, was under
his current surname, Svensson, not what is believed to be his family name,
Hellekant. Mr. Svensson changed his name after being convicted of the
crime.

"That seemed strange to us, so on Wednesday we asked the national agency
responsible for verifying application documents to check, and they could
not verify the transcript," Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson said in a telephone
interview on Thursday. "We were under the assumption that they had done it
because thats their responsibility."

Mr. Svensson offered no protest when another Karolinska official notified
him of his expulsion, she said.

Mr. Svensson did not respond to numerous attempts to reach him for this
article.

In 2000, Mr. Svensson, then Mr. Hellekant, was convicted of shooting a
trade union worker, Bjorn Soderberg, 41, seven times after a loud argument
outside Mr. Soderberg's apartment in a Stockholm suburb on the night of
Oct. 12, 1999. Mr. Soderberg had complained about a co-worker who
displayed his neo-Nazi beliefs at work, leading to the co-worker's loss of
a job and union position. The co-worker was a friend of Mr. Svensson's.

At the time of the killing, according to court records and Stockholm
police officials, Mr. Svensson was under surveillance for neo-Nazi
activities by the Swedish Security Service, the equivalent of the Federal
Bureau of Investigation.

Despite the conviction, Mr. Svensson maintained that he did not commit the
killing.

After serving 6 1/2 years of an 11-year sentence, Mr. Svensson was
released on parole in February 2007. According to Swedish prison
standards, inmates are usually released after serving two-thirds of their
sentence.

While imprisoned, Mr. Svensson took a number of online courses that met
the Karolinska's high standards. Two admissions committee members
interviewed him separately, Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson said. One was a
psychiatrist. But neither interviewer detected anything unusual or asked
him to explain his activities during the previous six-and-a-half-year
period, she said.

She notified Mr. Svensson's classmates by intranet on Thursday of the
decision to expel him. On Friday she said she would address the students,
her third meeting with the student body concerning Mr. Svensson's case.

Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson first met with students last fall to tell them
that a convicted murderer was a classmate.

She met with students again when Mr. Svensson identified himself before
his classmates. At that meeting, Mr. Svensson spoke for about 10 minutes
without apologizing for the murder or his past. He did say, "Today, I am
not the person I was 10 years ago," Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson said.

After Mr. Svensson spoke at that session, Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson said,
she discussed the case with his classmates. One group vehemently expressed
the view that he deserved to study medicine because he had served his
time. But others disagreed, saying they were scared and felt unsafe having
him as a classmate.

The proportion of supporters and critics among the speakers was about
even, she said, but many who seemed neutral asked for more information.

Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson said that she offered Mr. Svensson and his
classmates consultations with faculty members, including psychologists,
and that many responded.

Linnea Zetterman, a medical student at Umea University who went through
the same 45-minute interview process in applying to Karolinska, said it
seemed strange that the interviewers did not question him about the
six-and-a-half-year period.

The interviews "were rigid and made you wonder whether you were suited for
the profession," she said.

A number of doctors, writing in a number of recent issues of
Lakartidningen, a journal published by the Swedish Medical Association,
have argued that Mr. Svensson should not be allowed to become a doctor.

Also, the Swedish licensing body, which has no authority over medical
schools, has said it will not grant Mr. Svensson a medical license if he
graduates because of the conviction. That view left Karolinska officials
in a quandary over whether and how to tell Mr. Svensson's patients about
his past.

When Dr. Wallberg-Henriksson appealed to the Swedish government to resolve
the issue, she said she received mixed signals.

Because the expulsion does not resolve how to handle any future such
cases, Sweden must determine whether medical schools can admit a convicted
murderer, among other issues, she said.

Lawrence K. Altman reported from Stockholm last month and later added
updated information. Majsan Bostrom contributed reporting.

(source: New York Times)









********************************


Jan. 23




GERMANY:

Mass grave of possible Nazi victims uncovered----At least 40 bodies
unearthed near site of WW II-era German arms factory


At least 40 bodies found in a mass grave in the central German city of
Kassel could be the remains of slave laborers from a Nazi armaments
factory, a city official said Wednesday.

The first four skeletons were found last week at a construction site at
the University of Kassel, said police spokeswoman Sabine Knoell.
Twenty-six more were found on Monday and Tuesday, and about 10 more were
unearthed Wednesday, she said.

"It could well be that more skeletons will be found," she said. "We are
prepared for anything."

"Some of the remains appeared to have been laid out in rows, although that
was not always the case," she said.

According to preliminary examinations by the coroners office, the corpses
are somewhere between 50 and 100 years old. Knoell would not speculate,
however, on whether they could have died during wartime bombing or were
possible victims of Nazi crimes.

"But we are, naturally, in contact with historians," she said.

Site of factory

The area where the skeletons were found was the site of a factory that
built locomotives and tanks during World War II, and the Nazis forced
thousands of slave laborers to work there, said Kassel archivist
Frank-Roland Klaube.

"The evidence speaks against them being regular factory workers buried
quickly after an Allied bombing attack," he said.

"Among other things, there were no rings or watches found on the corpses,"
he said.

It is also known that in other areas of Kassel the SS, Adolf Hitlers
dreaded paramilitary organization, shot and hastily buried other victims
in the final days of the war, Klaube said. Still, there have been no
reports of mass murders on the site of the new discovery, he added.

Possibly from 19th century

The area was the site of a military hospital until 1870, and it could be
that the bodies were people who died there, he said. But that would mean
that the bodies are older than is currently believed.

"Experts are testing the remains to try to determine how and when they
died," Knoell said.

"We are very curious to see what the experts find," she said. "Results are
not expected until next week at the earliest."

(source: MSNBC News)







HUNGARY:

Hungary refuses to prosecute Nazi war criminal


The Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center has renewed its call for
Hungary to immediately prosecute a top Hungarian war criminal who was
never punished for his role in the mass murder of thousands of people
during World War II, despite being convicted of war crimes more than six
decades ago.

The organization's chief Nazi hunter, Dr. Efraim Zuroff, has lambasted as
"a travesty of justice" the Hungarian authorities' delay in prosecuting
Sandor Kepiro, 94, despite his past conviction in a Hungarian court for
war crimes committed in World War II.

"The problem is they are acting as if they have all the time in the world,
but we really don't have time," Zuroff said Tuesday.

Kepiro was convicted in 1944 for his role in the murder of 1,246 civilians
in the city of Novi Sad in January 1942, when he served as a gendarme with
an Hungarian army unit, the Wiesenthal Center said.

After details of the massacres in the region - which Hungary had annexed
as a prize for its collaboration with Nazi Germany - were revealed, Kepiro
was sentenced in 1944 to 10 years in jail for his role in the killings.

But after the Nazi invasion of Hungary that same year, Kepiro was cleared
by a Nazi-dominated military tribunal, which acquitted him and restored
his ranks. He went on to become the highest-ranking gendarmerie officer in
the city and participated in the deportation of Jews to Auschwitz, the
Wiesenthal Center said.

After the war, Kepiro escaped to Austria where he lived for three years.
Kepiro then moved to Argentina where he lived for nearly half a century
before returning to Budapest, where he was tracked down by the Wiesenthal
Center.

Last year, in a controversial ruling, a Hungarian court decided not to
enforce Kepiro's six-decade-old conviction.

The Hungarian government subsequently opened a new murder investigation in
the case last year.

"What has to happen for justice to be achieved?" Zuroff asked Monday at a
memorial service in Serbia for the victims of the 1942 mass murder.

"How is it possible that someone as obviously guilty as Kepiro, someone
who was convicted for his role in 1944 by a Hungarian court, is still a
free man, walking the streets of Budapest?" Zuroff said.

Kepiro has denied the allegations against him, asserting that while he was
present at the Novi Sad massacres, it was Hungarian soldiers - and not
gendarmes like him - who did the shooting.

(source: Jerusalem Post)



NORWAY:

The chosen ones: The war children born to Nazi fathers in a sinister
eugenics scheme speak out


They were the blue-eyed blonds born into a sinister SS scheme to further
the Aryan race. But the defeat of the Nazis left Norway's 'Lebensborn'
facing the vengeance of an entire nation. Here, five former war children
talk for the first time about their ordeal and their fight for
compensation




They stare blankly into the lens, their lips tellingly pursed. All are
the Norwegian subjects of a terrifying Nazi experiment.

All were involved in one of the most shocking trials of eugenics the world
has ever known. All are Lebensborn the "spring of life". And all are here
to tell their stories for the first time.

The Lebensborn Society was born on 12 December 1935, the brainchild of
Heinrich Himmler, Hitler's right-hand man and head of the SS. He had
designed a project to promote an "Aryan future" for the Third Reich and
turn around a declining birth rate in Germany. People were given
incentives to have more children in the Fatherland as well as in occupied
countries, most importantly in Scandinavia, where the Nordic gene and its
blond-haired, blue-eyed progeny was considered classically Aryan.

But after the conflict had ended, many of the Norwegians born into the
programme suffered. In an attempt to distance itself from the occupying
forces, the Norwegian government publicly vilified the children born by
Norwegian mothers and Nazi fathers. Many of those children subsequently
experienced intense bullying, and in some cases, extreme mental and
physical abuse. In recent years, a Lebensborn group in Norway has been
fighting what it sees as the Norwegian government's complicity in their
horrific ordeal.

Now, these once-persecuted children, many of whom are in their sixties,
have been brought together by British photographer Lucinda Marland, who
travelled to Norway to interview them and take their portraits, with a
1940s 5x4 plate camera, reproduced exclusively here.

"The people I met described themselves as the lucky ones and maintain that
hundreds of others were never able to come to terms with the prejudice and
cruelty they ' suffered," says Marland. "They were incredibly humble and
proud people still coming to terms with their demons; many of them would
be welling up when they were talking to me."

The Lebensborn programme arrived in Norway in March 1941, six years after
the scheme was started in Germany. The occupying soldiers were officially
encouraged to father children with the local women. They were reassured
that the Third Reich would take care of the child if they did not wish to
marry the mother, or were already married. As well as paying all the costs
for the birth, the Lebensborn association gave the mothers substantial
child support, including money for clothes, as well as a pram or cot. It
was noted at the time that only a small proportion of the German fathers
wanted to marry the pregnant women and bring them back to the German
Reich.

Hotels and villas were requisitioned and 10 Lebensborn homes were
established from scratch. Here, more than 8,000 children were registered,
and issued with a Lebensborn number and file containing their medical
records.

For many of the young, impressionable Norwegian girls who had become
pregnant at the hands of the invaders, it was a convenient place to give
birth well away from the disapproving eyes of their peers, with access to
the best available care.

But towards the end of the war, the exiled Norwegian government which had
set up shop in London started broadcasting ominous warnings to
collaborators in Norway. One said: "We have previously issued a warning
and we repeat it here of the price these women will pay for the rest of
their lives: they will be held in contempt by all Norwegians for their
lack of restraint."

Soon afterwards, the war ended, Himmler committed suicide and Norway's
pre-war leaders returned. Norwegians cut off the hair of many of the
"German whores" who had sired children with the Nazi soldiers, and they
were paraded through the streets and spat at. Though the women hadn't
broken any law, several thousand were arrested and many interned. A large
number lost their jobs, for as little as having been seen talking to a
German, and many were traumatised for life. "We will never be rid of the
stigma, not until we are dead and buried," says one of the Lebensborn
interviewed by Marland, Paul Hansen. "I don't want to be buried in a
grave; I want my ashes to be scattered to the winds at least then I won't
be picked on any more."

The condemnation escalated. The Norwegian government tried to deport the
Lebensborn to Germany but the scheme was vetoed by the Allies. In July
1945, one newspaper expressed the fear that Lebensborn boys would "bear
the germ of some of those typical masculine German characteristics of
which the world has now seen more than enough". A leading psychiatrist
advised that a large proportion of the 8,000 (officially registered)
children must be carrying bad genes and therefore would be mentally
retarded; "genetically bad", he said, they "belonged in special
institutions". As a result, hundreds of children were forcibly
incarcerated in mental institutions. Here they were often abused, raped
and their skin scrubbed until it bled. A member of the Norwegian ministry
of social affairs said of them in July 1945: "To believe these children
will become decent citizens is to believe rats in the cellar will become
house pets." '

Through legal action, many of the children have sought compensation from
the Norwegian government for its discrimination against them. A few were
offered limited financial recompense. But still officials refuse to take
the blame. "The government has acknowledged that several war children have
been subject to harassment in society," says government lawyer Thomas
Naalsund. "But it is highly difficult to say now, 50 years later, that the
government was responsible for these events."

Last year, 157 of the children appealed to the European Court of Human
Rights but lost on the grounds that their problems happened too long ago.
"There is a hypocrisy at the heart of Norway, home of the Nobel Peace
Prize, a country that prides itself on resolving conflicts around the
world but refuses to acknowledge its own victims of war," says the
Lebensborns' lawyer, Randi Spydevold. "I'm disappointed and embarrassed on
behalf of Norway. I thought Norway was a great country, the best country
for human rights; I didn't disbelieve that for one moment until I took
this case."

Now, what hope that still exists among the Lebensborn is in their desire
that by sharing their stories, one day an international standard will be
set that will prevent future war children from being discriminated
against, and enduring the atrocities that they themselves have had to live
through. Their chilling tales, some of which are reproduced here, are just
one small step towards that potential resolution.

Ellen Voie: 'I was locked in a dark room'

I was born in 1942 in a Lebensborn home, where I stayed until I was
adopted aged two. My adoptive parents were incredibly cruel: they beat me
and locked me in a small, dark room for hours. To this day I'm still
afraid of the dark and have nightmares.

We lived in a small community where everyone seemed to know I was a German
child and told me how awful I was. I was very disruptive; I couldn't
concentrate. When I was 16 the local priest refused to confirm me because
I did not have a baptism certificate. I had to go to the local authority
where I found out that my parents had changed my name.

Then I went to Denmark to study. While there I worked as a nursery nurse,
and fell in love with a German, but my parents disapproved and I had to
return to Norway to continue studying.

A year after I returned, a friend and I were walking to the cinema when a
car pulled up with some boys in it. My friend said she knew them so we got
in, but the car broke down. My friend went off with one of the boys to get
spare parts and left me alone with the other boy, who raped and almost
killed me. A taxi driver saved my life.

I later discovered I was pregnant from the attack. I was 19 years old. My
parents threw me out of the house and put me in a home, where I stayed
until my son was born. My parents then insisted I give up my baby; I was
only allowed to hold him for a few minutes before they took him away. But
I was determined that history would not repeat itself and with the help of
a social worker I got my son back.

Despite all the hardships, I got an education and my work as a social
worker has helped me deal with my past. I've dedicated my adult life to
helping others, children in particular. It helps me to forget my own
tormented past. I now live with my husband and dogs in Oslo.

Paul Hansen: 'They classed me as a retard'

I think my mother's family put pressure on her to give me up, so I was
born in a Lebensborn home in 1942 and my mother left me there.

I later learnt that after the war a government delegation came to the home
to decide what to do with the 20 war children, including me, who had been
left there. We were lined up and the doctor said he would take us. It
turned out that he was the head of a mental institution. There was no
medical prognosis behind his decision; it was just that we were war
children, and therefore must be "retarded" due to our parentage. They made
no effort to trace any of our family members, they just locked us up with
children so sick that some were incontinent and incapable of feeding
themselves. I was four years old.

By the time I was released I had lost any chance of a proper education and
for the next few years I went from one home to another.

I was eventually sent to a special school for children with learning
disabilities and mental illness. This was the only formal education I
received. War children were segregated from the rest of the school. We
were not allowed any contact with the outside community. I was then moved
to a boys' home and then another mental institution, where I was finally
old enough to sign myself out. The people there helped me get a job in a
factory. My colleagues used to taunt me mercilessly until one day I stood
up and told them what had happened to me. They never taunted me again and
I stayed there for 17 years.

In 1975 I got married but my wife had a nervous breakdown and we divorced
in 1977. Then I lived with someone for nearly 20 years but she died of
cancer.

I now work as a cleaner and janitor at the University of Oslo and have a
long-term girlfriend. As much as it hurts to talk about my past, I do so
because it's important that people know what happened to us. I spent the
first 20 years of my life in mental institutions just because my father
was a German.

Kikki Skjermo: 'I was raped when I was 10'

I was born in 1945 near Trondheim. My mother was away a lot, finding work.
It was my grandparents who brought me up and told me about my father. They
provided for me, but never showed me any warmth. I felt like I lived
behind a wall of silence; life was very empty and confusing.

At 10 years old I was raped by a local man, who had a deep hatred of the
Germans. I didn't know him but he knew I was a German child. He told me
people like me were born to be used. I didn't dare tell anyone; I stayed
in bed for a week pretending I had a stomach upset.

At 15 I was granted special permission to marry my husband. It took me a
couple of years to tell him about my history but he has always been a huge
support and we've been married for 47 years.

Both he and my children encouraged me to trace my father, who I met for
the first time when I was 42. We have a wonderful relationship and, when
my daughter got married, she asked if my father could walk her down the
aisle to show the world that the spell was broken.

It's taken me a long time to be able to say, it's OK, I'm a German child.
It's important to speak out to help other war children who aren't as
fortunate as me.

Bjorn Drivdal: 'They beat me up at school'

Growing up in Oslo, I was told my father was sent to the Eastern Front,
where he died in action. But my mother would never tell me anything more
about him.

I later learnt that when my mother discovered she was pregnant she tried
to get an abortion, but the German authorities wouldn't let her.

I endured school until I was 15; I was always being beaten and couldn't
understand why. I then went to sea, working mainly on cargo ships. On
shore leave, I'd often find myself on the shadier side of town I found it
easier to be around people with something to hide.

I've been married twice and have five children. Both marriages ended in
divorce; I wasn't easy to live with.

When I turned 57 I took early retirement because I couldn't concentrate
and was having nightmares, and it was then that I confronted my past. I
started seeing a psychologist and learnt to explore who I was.

I decided to go to Germany. I knew where my father had lived, so I went to
the local newspaper, which helped me with my research. I found my father's
grave and discovered he had actually died in 1974 in a car crash, not in
the war as I had been led to believe. It was a devastating blow. But my
trip to Germany wasn't all bad; I met my two half-sisters, who had no idea
I existed, and this summer my nephew and his children are coming to visit
me.

Gerd Fleischer: 'I was called a whore'

My mother and father planned to marry, but to marry an SS officer you had
to prove three generations of Aryan blood. My mother's Lapp heritage meant
she was not pure enough.

I was born in 1942. My father returned to Germany while my mother fell
into poverty, not qualifying for any support from the state, my father or
even the Lebensborn programme.

We lived a relatively untroubled life in Lapland until I went to school.
One day a fellow pupil called me a "German whore"; I didn't know what this
meant so I ran home and asked my mother. She told me that not everyone is
open-minded.

My mother then married a former resistance fighter, who hated anything
German, particularly me. Abuse and beatings soon became a regular part of
my home life. At 13, I ran away.

Somehow I survived, putting myself through school. I remember being
lonely, hungry and cold. The authorities knew about me but did nothing to
help.

When I was 18, I left Norway and didn't return for 18 years. I worked as
an au pair in England, and worked and studied in Germany. I managed to
trace my father, who initially denied all knowledge of me. But when we met
it was physically obvious I was his daughter. I was furious at him even
more so when he spoke ill of my mother. I successfully took him to court
for the maintenance he had never paid to me.

Before returning to Norway I spent several years in Mexico, where I
fostered two street children. I brought them home with me, but soon
realised that Norway hadn't progressed in its attitude towards ethnic
minorities. So I founded the organisation Seif [Self Help for Immigrants
and Refugees] to fight for justice for all.

(source: The Independent)