3 ms·

Does anybody know why he only now went to trial?

• ekianjo 10y ago
  Nazis were judged at Nurnberg already and most of the time only the higher ranking officers were severely punished. Judging complicity 75 years after the facts is purely a political move.
• lucozade 10y ago
  Up until about ten years ago, the general approach was to find and prosecute those who were responsible for the Holocaust i.e. made decisions that caused or prolonged it, or those who actively participated in atrocities. For example, the Eichmann trial was controversial at the time because he was involved in transport and not the camps directly even though he was a colonel (it was also controversial for a number of other reasons). That approach changed to include those who were present but with no evidence of direct involvement. The Demjanjuk conviction gave confidence to prosecutors that this was a viable strategy. Given the age of the defendants, there's been a certain amount of urgency to accelerate these prosecutions. I have some reservations about this change of tack. It plays to a narrative that the prosecutions are vindictive and a sign of desperation. With the spread of neo-Nazism in Europe, making ex-Nazis and SS appear as victims seems very risky to me.