Compensation for National Socialist Injustice - Indemnification Provisions

Page created by Lonnie Peterson
 
CONTINUE READING
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice - Indemnification Provisions
Compensation for
National Socialist Injustice
Indemnification Provisions
Compensation for
National Socialist Injustice
Indemnification Provisions
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 3

       Contents

I.      History of German provisions relating to compensation
        and the consequences of the Second World War                                            5
1.1     Beginnings of compensation under occupation law                                         5
1.2     Restitution                                                                             5
1.3     Initial compensation provisions in the occupation zones                                 6
1.4     Luxembourg Agreement and Settlement Convention                                          6
1.5     Payments in former East Germany                                                         7
1.6     Additional Federal Compensation Act, Federal Compensation Act
        and Final Federal Compensation Act                                                      7
1.7     General Act Regulating Compensation for War-Induced Losses                              9
1.8     Compensation provisions under special legislation                                       9
1.9     Extra-statutory provisions of the Länder							10
1.10    First comprehensive agreements with European states					                                10
1.11    Arrangements with Eastern European states						11
1.12    Comprehensive agreement with the United States						                                    11
1.13    Washington Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets						12
1.14    Foundation for Remembrance, Responsibility and the Future				                           12
1.15    Ghetto Work Recognition Guidelines and pension substitution supplement			               13
1.16    Payment to former Soviet prisoners of war in recognition of their treatment
        in German detention									14
1.17    Transforming “Wiedergutmachung”							14

II.     Extra-statutory federal compensation payments						16
2.1     Hardship provision for victims of pseudo-medical experiments				                        16
2.2     Hardship Fund for those not of the Jewish faith who were persecuted on racial grounds   17
2.3     Extra-statutory provisions for Jewish victims						17
2.4     Compensation for non-Jewish victims							19
Page 4   Contents

                    III.   Compensation under the General Act Regulating Compensation
                           for War-Induced Losses							21
                    3.1    Government guidelines on hardship compensation to victims of
                           National Socialist injustice under the General Act Regulating
                           Compensation for War-Induced Losses					21
                    3.2    Payments to victims of the National Socialist military judiciary		   22

                    IV.    Provisions for the Länder in former East Germany			                  23
                    4.1    Compensation Pension Act						23
                    4.2    Extra-statutory provisions based on the Compensation Pension Act		   23
                    4.3    Property law provisions in the territory of the former GDR			        24

                    Annexes									26
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 5

      I. History of German provisions relating to
         compensation and the consequences of the
         Second World War

1.1 Beginnings of                            alongside each other, and these were diffi-
    compensation under                       cult to keep track of, both in terms of con-
                                             tent and in organisational terms. The first
    occupation law                           clear step in standardising this area of law
                                             was to draw a line between restitution and
Almost immediately after the end of the compensation.
Second World War, it became clear that
compensation needed to be provided to
those who had suffered damage as a result
                                                   1.2 Restitution
of National Socialist injustice. Those who
had suffered oppression due to their po- The three Western powers passed restitution
litical opposition to National Socialism or acts for their occupation zones and for West
on the grounds of race, religion or ideology Berlin in 1947 and 1949. These laws dealt
were particularly affected. The first legal with restitution of and compensation for
provisions, drawn up in 1945 by the occu- property that had been unjustly confiscated
pying powers and local authorities, were between 1933 and 1945 as a result of racial,
aimed at this group of people. They were religious or political persecution. Following
largely welfare-oriented in nature and were the establishment of the Federal Republic of
based on the needs of the recipients.        Germany, restitution claims against the Ger-
    The establishment of Länder (states) in man Reich and other German entities in-
the three Western zones (the US, British and volved in such confiscation were governed
French occupation zones) created larger ad- by the Federal Act for the Settlement of the
ministrative units. These introduced uni- Monetary Restitution Liabilities of the Ger-
form regional compensation provisions. man Reich and Legal Entities of Equal Legal
Alongside the purely welfare-based provi- Status (Federal Restitution Act) of 19 July
sions, further measures were taken that gave 1957 (Federal Law Gazette I p. 734)1.
victims a legal entitlement to compensa-
tion. However, a large number of different 1 A list of laws mentioned in the text and their original
compensation provisions continued to exist German titles can be found in Annex 8.
Page 6   History of German provisions relating to compensation
         and the consequences of the Second World War

                            After German unification, analogous         1.4 Luxembourg Agreement
                        provisions were adopted for the new Länder
                                                                            and Settlement
                        (what used to be East Germany) in the Act
                        Regulating Open Property Matters, which             Convention
                        entered into force together with the Unifi-
                        cation Treaty, and the Victims of Nazi Per-     Just as the Länder and local authorities had
                        secution Compensation Act (Article 3 of the     done prior to its establishment, the Federal
                        Compensation and Corrective Payments            Republic of Germany continued to treat
                        Act).                                           moral and financial compensation for the
                            The restitution process was concluded       wrongs committed by the National Socialist
                        a long time ago. The application deadlines      regime as a priority. At a special meeting of
                        have passed and the administrative proce-       the German Bundestag on 27 October 1951,
                        dures have ceased to operate.                   Federal Chancellor Adenauer declared that
                                                                        Germany was responsible for the atrocities
                                                                        committed by the National Socialist regime.
                        1.3 Initial compensation                        He stressed that the German people had an
                            provisions in the                           obligation to provide moral and material
                                                                        compensation, and he offered to enter into
                            occupation zones                            negotiations with the state of Israel and
                                                                        Jewish interest groups. One month later,
                        Compensation law governs personal in-           23 Jewish organisations joined forces and
                        jury and damage to property not covered by      founded the ‘Conference on Jewish Mate-
                        restitution. Land laws were adopted in the      rial Claims against Germany’ (Jewish Claims
                        American occupation zone as early as 1946.      Conference, or JCC, for short) with the aim
                        They provided for provisional payments          of enforcing compensation claims against
                        for healthcare, vocational training, self-em-   Germany.
                        ployment, averting financial distress, and          Talks with representatives of Israel and
                        pensions for victims and their dependants.      the JCC were taken up in The Hague on 21
                        On 26 April 1949, the Act on the Treatment      March 1952. These negotiations focused
                        of Victims of National Socialist Persecution    on two issues: (i) the aim of concluding an
                        in the Area of Social Security was adopted      agreement between Germany and Israel re-
                        for the entire American occupation zone         garding global compensation for the State
                        by the Southern German Länder Council. It       of Israel, and (ii) the two ‘Hague Protocols’
                        was promulgated by Land laws in Bavaria,        (Federal Law Gazette II 1953, p. 35, 85) be-
                        Bremen, Baden-Württemberg and Hesse in          tween the German government and the JCC
                        August 1949. In line with Article 125 of the    governing individual compensation for the
                        Basic Law, these Land laws became federal       victims of National Socialist persecution.
                        law when the Federal Republic of Germany            These two agreements are inextri-
                        was established and the Basic Law entered       cably linked. They were both signed
                        into force. In the Länder of the British and    in Luxembourg at the same time, on
                        French occupation zones and West Berlin,        10 September 1952, and are known as the
                        similar laws were enacted which, with the       ‘Luxembourg Agreement’. Germany agreed
                        exception of Länder in the British occupa-      to pay DM 3 billion to the state of Israel and
                        tion zone, covered the same types of damage     DM 450 million to the JCC.
                        as the Act on the Treatment of Victims of
                        National Socialist Persecution in the Area of
                        Social Security.
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 7

    The payment to Israel was intended             support for victims of the Nazi regime living
to help uprooted Jewish refugees without           in other countries and also refused to accept
means who had come from Germany and                that it shared moral responsibility for the
from territories that had previously been          crimes of Nazi Germany.
under German rule. A large part of this pay-           Under the laws in force in the Soviet
ment was made in the form of deliveries of         zone, however, victims of fascism who were
goods.                                             viewed favourably by the system received
    According to the second Hague Protocol,        special benefits in the context of general
the DM 450 million fund was intended for           healthcare, old-age pensions and survivors’
the support and integration of Jewish vic-         pensions. They were also given lump-sum
tims of persecution living outside Israel. The     honorary pensions.
JCC was tasked with implementing this.                 Because the reinstatement of private
    In the first Hague Protocol (Federal Law       property was incompatible with nationali-
Gazette II 1953, p. 85), the German gov-           sation efforts of the Soviet occupation zone
ernment committed itself to setting up a           and subsequently the GDR, the only exist-
legislative programme for restitution and          ing compensation legislation – that of the
compensation provisions across the Federal         state of Thuringia, which came into force in
Republic of Germany. The protocol defined          1945 – soon ceased to be applied and was re-
the main principles of this legislation. Prin-     pealed in 1952.
ciples for uniform restitution and compen-             The GDR concluded settlement agree-
sation legislation had already been set down       ments with Austria, Denmark, Finland and
in the fourth part of the Settlement Con-          Sweden that covered all restitution claims of
vention for the Western part of Germany            victims of National Socialist persecution liv-
that was concluded with the three Western          ing in these countries.
occupying powers at the end of the Western
allies’ occupation in 1952 (Federal Law Ga-
zette II 1954, p. 57, 181, 194).
                                        1.6 Additional Federal
                                            Compensation Act,
1.5 Payments in former East                 Federal Compensation
      Germany                               Act and Final Federal
Ever since its foundation in 1949, com-     Compensation Act
munist East Germany, officially known as
the German Democratic Republic (GDR),              The first compensation act that applied
steadfastly refused to follow the example          throughout the Federal Republic of Ger-
of the Federal Republic of Germany when            many was the Additional Federal Compen-
it came to compensating victims of Nazi            sation Act, which was adopted on 18 Sep-
persecution.                                       tember 1953 (Federal Law Gazette I 1953,
    The GDR’s anti-fascist foundation myth         p. 1387) and entered into force on 1 October
played a particularly important role in the        1953. The Additional Federal Compensation
state’s resistance towards claims for com-         Act was based on the Act on the Treatment
pensation from abroad. The East German             of Victims of National Socialist Persecution
state did not see itself as the Third Reich’s      in the Area of Social Security (see section
legal successor. On the contrary, it viewed it-    1.3), but it considerably expanded the scope
self as being part of an anti-fascist tradition.   of the earlier piece of legislation. Neverthe-
On this basis, it did not provide material         less, the provisions soon proved insufficient.
Page 8   History of German provisions relating to compensation
         and the consequences of the Second World War

                            The Federal Compensation Act was             through secondary procedures if they are
                        adopted on 29 June 1956 (Federal Law Ga-         proven wrong according to the current in-
                        zette I 1956, p. 562). It entered into force     terpretation of the law.
                        with retroactive effect from 1 October 1953          Numerous implementing regulations to
                        and fundamentally changed compensation           the Federal Compensation Act have been
                        for the victims of National Socialism. In        issued over the past decades. The first three
                        addition to extending eligibility, it made a     of these are amended regularly to adapt
                        number of changes that benefited victims.        the ongoing payments (pensions) to rising
                        The act also introduced cost-sharing be-         costs of living. The fourth implementing
                        tween the Federation and the Länder. Previ-      regulation governs the reimbursement of
                        ously, the Länder had borne the costs.           insurance companies for costs incurred un-
                            Under the Federal Compensation Act,          der section 182(1) of the Federal Compensa-
                        compensation could be provided in the            tion Act. The fifth implementing regulation
                        form of pensions, one-off payments, re-          identifies the pension schemes that were
                        training grants, medical treatment and           dissolved by National Socialist oppressive
                        pensions for surviving dependants. The           measures. In the sixth implementing reg-
                        original application deadline under the          ulation (concentration camp directory),
                        Federal Compensation Act was 1 Octo-             the German government established which
                        ber 1957. This was subsequently extended         prison camps were to be considered con-
                        to 1 April 1958 in the first Act Amending        centration camps in the context of the pro-
                        the Federal Compensation Act, which was          vision in section 31(2) of the Federal Com-
                        adopted on 1 July 1957 (Federal Law Gazette      pensation Act governing the assumed loss
                        I 1957, p. 663).                                 of earning power.
                            In applying the legislation, however, it         The Federal Compensation Act is imple-
                        soon became clear that further changes           mented by the compensation authorities of
                        were needed. Lawmakers started to work           the Länder. Only victims of persecution by
                        on a final revision of the Act. Following        the National Socialist regime are eligible
                        four years of intense negotiations in the        for compensation. Expellees as defined in
                        competent committees of the German               the Federal Expellees Act as well as stateless
                        Bundestag and Bundesrat, the Final Fed-          persons and refugees as defined in the Ge-
                        eral Compensation Act was adopted on             neva Convention were also eligible for sup-
                        14 September 1965 (Federal Law Gazette I         port under the Federal Compensation Act.
                        1965, p. 1315), its very name emphasising        In this context, victims of persecution are
                        that it was to be the last. This law signifi-    defined as those who suffered damage to
                        cantly extended the 1 April 1958 applica-        life, limb or health, deprivation of freedom,
                        tion deadline: Article VIII (1) of the Final     depreciation of property or assets, or dam-
                        Federal Compensation Act specified that          age to their business or professional career
                        no claims could be made after 31 Decem-          as a result of National Socialist oppression
                        ber 1969. This means that applications can       due to their political opposition to National
                        no longer be submitted. The Final Federal        Socialism or for reasons of race, religion or
                        Compensation Act did not cover Nazi vic-         ideology.
                        tims in the communist countries of the for-          Those who suffered oppression as a re-
                        mer Warsaw Pact.                                 sult of being involved in artistic or aca-
                            However, it is still possible for payments   demic pursuits of which the Nazi regime
                        for damage to health to be increased if the      disapproved, or because they were close to
                        victim’s condition deteriorates. It is also      a victim of persecution, are also treated as
                        possible for initial decisions to be revised     victims of persecution.
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 9

    Surviving dependants and close rela-       6 were fulfilled. There were exceptions for
tives who were also adversely affected by      expellees (immigrants of ethnic German
National Socialist oppression are consid-      origin), returnees and persons who settled in
ered to be victims of persecution under the    the Federal Republic of Germany’s territory
Federal Compensation Act, as well.             after 31 December 1952 by way of family
    Those who suffered general war-in-         reunification, but these are of virtually no
duced losses as a result of the war started    practical importance today.
by Nazi Germany, for example prisoners             In principle, claims had to be submitted
of war or victims of the bomb war, are not     within one year after the Act entered into
considered to be victims of targeted Na-       force, i.e. by 31 December 1958. If the sub-
tional Socialist persecution as defined in     mission deadline had passed, an extension
the Federal Compensation Act.                  could be granted for one more year, i.e. until
                                               31 December 1959.
                                                   Today, cases under section 5 are only
1.7 General Act Regulating                     being processed; no new claims can be
    Compensation for                           submitted.
                                                   The Central Customs Authority’s service
    War-Induced Losses                         centre in Cologne is responsible for pro-
                                               cessing applications (see Annex 7, II for the
The General Act Regulating Compensa- address).
tion for War-Induced Losses of 5 November
1957 (Federal Law Gazette I 1957, p. 1747)
concerns the claims of those who suffered
                                               1.8 Compensation
damage during the National Socialist regime        provisions under special
and did not qualify as victims as defined
in section 1 of the Federal Compensation           legislation
Act. While the compensation laws cover all
property and non-property claims, this Act The compensation and restitution laws were
provides for compensation only in cases supplemented by various compensation
of damage to life, limb, or health as well as provisions under special legislation.
deprivation of freedom. Section 5 of the Act       A piece of legislation aimed at pub-
grants a right to compensation for unlawful lic-service employees who had been re-
violations of these legal rights in accord- moved from public service under the Na-
ance with the general legal provisions, in tional Socialist regime and had lost their
particular in accordance with the provisions rights (Act Governing Compensation for
on state liability and civil law regulations National Socialist Injustice for Public-Sec-
on unlawful acts (section 823 ff. of the Civil tor Employees) entered into force on 11 May
Code).                                         1951, with retroactive effect from 1 April
   Claims under section 5 of the Act were 1951. It aimed to place public-service em-
recognised only if, on 31 December 1952, the ployees who had suffered persecution in the
victim had his/her domicile or was perma- position in which they would have found
nently resident within the Act’s territory of themselves had the persecution not taken
application at the time or in a state which place. On 18 May 1952, it was followed by a
had recognised the government of the Fed- similar law for public-sector employees liv-
eral Republic of Germany by 1 April 1956, ing abroad who had emigrated as a result
or if one of the other residence or qualify- of the persecution suffered. Both of these
ing date requirements specified in section pieces of legislation were made obsolete by
Page 10   History of German provisions relating to compensation
          and the consequences of the Second World War

                         the Administrative Consequences of the           1.9 Extra-statutory
                         War Conclusion Act of 20 September 1994.
                                                                              provisions of the Länder
                             The Act on Social Insurance Pensions for
                         Victims of National Socialism was adopted        Starting in 1950, individual Länder intro-
                         by the economic council of the combined          duced their own rules providing for one-off
                         economic area (US and British occupation         or ongoing assistance payments for those
                         zone) on 22 August 1949, before the German       among their citizens who were victims of
                         Bundestag had convened for the first time.       National Socialist injustice but had been un-
                         It was aimed at those whose social insur-        able to fulfil the residence or cut-off date
                         ance claims, especially pensions, had been       requirements laid out in the relevant legis-
                         reduced or lost. Most of those affected were     lation or who had missed application dead-
                         Jewish people and political opponents of         lines through no fault of their own. Gen-
                         the Nazi regime who had fled or emigrated        erally speaking, these provisions are not
                         to other countries. In 1950, this Act was ex-    limited to victims of persecution as defined
                         tended to the Länder of the former French        in section 1 of the Federal Compensation
                         occupation zone, making provisions uni-          Act. In many cases, payments for surviving
                         form across the country. A consolidated          dependants can also be provided under the
                         provision for the entire country – the Act       Länder provisions. As with the extra-statu-
                         Amending and Supplementing Regulations           tory indemnification arrangements of the
                         on Compensation for National Socialist In-       federal government, this is usually possible
                         justice in the Social Insurance System – was     only in cases of special (financial) distress.
                         adopted on 22 December 1970 (Federal Law         There is no legal entitlement to payments.
                         Gazette I 1970, p. 1846). The costs were – and   See Annex 2 for information about provi-
                         still are – covered exclusively by the pension   sions in the individual Länder.
                         and accident insurance providers without
                         government involvement.
                             Jewish veterans who had fought on the
                                                                          1.10 First comprehensive
                         front in the First World War, were victims of         agreements with
                         National Socialist oppression as described in
                         the Federal Compensation Act and had lost             European states
                         (part of) the pensions to which they were
                         entitled as victims of war received compen-      From 1959 to 1964, the Federal Republic of
                         sation under the Federal Act on Compensa-        Germany concluded comprehensive agree-
                         tion for National Socialist Injustice through    ments with Austria, Belgium, Denmark,
                         War Disablement and Survivors’ Pensions of       France, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, the Neth-
                         25 June 1958 (Federal Law Gazette I 1958, p.     erlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and
                         412). This piece of legislation was made ob-     the UK for the benefit of nationals of these
                         solete by the first Regulatory Reform Act of     countries who had suffered National Social-
                         24 April 1986 (Federal Law Gazette I 1986, p.    ist persecution. Germany made available a
                         560). A corresponding law for claimants res-     total of DM 971 million (€496.46 million)
                         ident abroad was adopted on 3 August 1953        on the basis of these agreements. The gov-
                         (Federal Law Gazette I 1953, p. 843) and en-     ernments of the countries concerned were
                         tered into force with retroactive effect from    responsible for distributing these funds
                         1 October 1950.                                  amongst the victims. The comprehensive
                                                                          agreements have now been closed.
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 11

1.11 Arrangements with 		                           Germany conducted a bilateral exchange
     Eastern European states                    of notes with the Czech Republic on 29 De-
                                                cember 1997 in which the two countries
Following German reunification and the          agreed to establish the German-Czech Fu-
end of the East-West conflict, the German       ture Fund – an endowment fund under
government also concluded agreements            Czech law, headquartered in Prague, funded
with Eastern European countries govern-         by both countries and designed for a period
ing compensation for victims of National        of ten years. The aim of the fund is to fi-
Socialism in Central and Eastern Europe.        nance social projects serving the two coun-
These were modelled after the agreements        tries’ common interests, especially projects
on lump-sum compensation that had been          that benefit victims of National Socialist
concluded with Western European coun-           violence. Examples include care for the el-
tries between 1959 and 1964. The primary        derly, support for ethnic minorities and
aim of these was to provide humanitarian        joint economic and environmental projects.
aid in cases of hardship, rather than com-          Between 1998 and 2000, funds amount-
pensating victims for damage to property.       ing to DM 80 million were made available
To be eligible for payments, applicants had     for similar measures in other Central and
to prove that they had been victims of per-     Eastern European countries with which no
secution as defined in section 1 of the Fed-    comprehensive compensation agreements
eral Compensation Act.                          have been concluded (known as the ‘Hirsch
    The Federal Republic of Germany and         Initiative’, which covered Albania, Croatia,
the Republic of Poland conducted a bilateral    Hungary, Macedonia, Romania, Slovakia,
exchange of notes on 16 October 1991 es-        Slovenia and former Yugoslavia). Various
tablishing the Foundation for German-Pol-       national institutions, usually the national
ish Reconciliation in Poland, which is sub-     Red Cross, assumed responsibility for carry-
ject to Polish law and was financed with        ing out the initiative.
a one-off contribution of DM 500 million
(€255.64 million). The funds were intended
for persons who had suffered serious dam-
                                                1.12 Comprehensive
age to health during the Second World War            agreement with the
due to National Socialist injustice and were
in financial distress at the time.                   United States
    Similarly, foundations for ‘Understand-
ing and Reconciliation’ were established in     A comprehensive agreement between Ger-
three successor states of the Soviet Union      many and the US was concluded on 19 Sep-
– one in Minsk (Republic of Belarus), one       tember 1995. It dealt with compensation for
in Moscow (Russian Federation) and one in       victims of National Socialism who were al-
Kyiv (Ukraine) – and endowed with a total of    ready US nationals at the time of their per-
DM 1 billion (€0.51 billion). The three foun-   secution and had not previously received
dations gave the assurance of making pay-       any compensation. The criteria were based
ments to National Socialist victims in other    on those of the Federal Compensation Act
states of the former Soviet Union.              (persecution on the grounds of race, religion
    The Federal Republic of Germany             or ideology). Further criteria also included
granted separate assistance amounting to        detention in a concentration camp and
DM 2 million (€1.02 million) to Estonia, Lat-   forced labour. In terms of content and ap-
via and Lithuania. These funds were used        proach, it was modelled after similar agree-
especially to support social institutions for   ments that had been concluded with other
victims of National Socialism.
Page 12   History of German provisions relating to compensation
          and the consequences of the Second World War

                         Western powers between 1959 and 1964 (see       tion online at www.lostart.de (see Annex 7,
                         section 1.10). Approximately DM 3 million       VI). There is also the option of conducting
                         (€1.5 million) were made available. The US      provenance research, which offers access to
                         government was responsible for allocating       the results of investigations into primary
                         the funds.                                      and secondary sources as well as specialist
                             An additional payment of DM 34.5 mil-       literature. Provenance research can also be
                         lion (€17.6 million) was made under a           performed via the Federal Office for Cen-
                         supplementary agreement of 25 January           tral Services and Unresolved Property Issues
                         1999, which concluded the comprehensive         (BADV) under www.badv.bund.de.
                         agreement.                                          Thanks to the implementation of the
                                                                         Washington principles and the joint state-
                                                                         ment by the Federation, the Länder and na-
                         1.13 Washington Conference                      tional associations of local authorities, and
                              on Holocaust-Era                           on the basis of research performed, a num-
                                                                         ber of paintings by well-known artists have
                              Assets                                     already been returned from public owner-
                                                                         ship to their legitimate owners or their heirs.
                         A Conference on Holocaust-Era Assets took
                         place in Washington, D.C., in December
                         1998. It was attended by Germany and 43
                                                                         1.14 Foundation for
                         other countries as well as 12 non-govern-           Remembrance,
                         mental organisations and the Vatican. The
                         result was a legally non-binding agreement          Responsibility
                         on principles concerning works of art that          and the Future
                         had been confiscated by the National Social-
                         ists (Washington Declaration of 3 Decem-        The Foundation for Remembrance, Respon-
                         ber 1998). In acknowledgement of its his-       sibility and the Future (Stiftung Erinnerung,
                         torical and moral responsibility, Germany       Verantwortung und Zukunft, or EVZ) was
                         issued a joint statement by the Federation,     set up in order to provide compensation to
                         the Länder and national associations of lo-     former forced labourers. It was established
                         cal authorities on 9 December 1999 regard-      by the Act on the Creation of a Foundation
                         ing the implementation of this agreement.       for Remembrance, Responsibility and the
                         In this document, Germany committed it-         Future of 2 August 2000 (Federal Law Ga-
                         self to tracing and returning art confiscated   zette I p. 1263, most recently amended by
                         during National Socialism, especially Jewish    the Act of 21 December 2008, Federal Law
                         property.                                       Gazette I p. 1797) and equipped with DM
                             A manual, published in February 2001        10.1 billion (€5.16 billion). These monies
                         and revised in November 2007, offers prac-      were made available by the Federal Republic
                         tical guidance on tracing and identifying       of Germany and by German companies.
                         works of art confiscated by the National So-        The main purpose of the Foundation was
                         cialists and for preparing decisions on their   to make financial resources available for in-
                         possible return.                                dividual one-off payments to affected sur-
                             The German Lost Art Foundation reg-         vivors. The payments were made by partner
                         ularly publishes the information it has on      organisations in the various countries.
                         its database about works of art that were           Resources from the Foundation were
                         moved, transferred or confiscated in con-       primarily granted to those who had been
                         nection with National Socialist persecu-        subjected to forced labour in concentration
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 13

camps and ghettos as well as to victims who        1.15 Ghetto Work
had been deported from their home coun-
                                                        Recognition Guidelines
tries and subjected to forced labour while
being imprisoned or subjected to prison-like            and pension substitution
conditions. Payments were also made to vic-
tims of forced labour in agriculture.
                                                        supplement
     Section 11(1), fifth sentence, of the Foun-
dation Act also provided for payments to           Under the Ghetto Pensions Act, which was
compensate victims for other personal in-          adopted in 2002, Holocaust survivors who
jury suffered in connection with National          took on remunerated employment of their
Socialist injustice, for example in the course     own free will while detained in a ghetto that
of medical experiments or in the case of           had been created by the National Socialists
death or serious damage to the health of a         are eligible for a social security pension.
child kept in a home for forced labourers’             Numerous claims under the Ghetto
children. Under certain conditions, pay-           Pensions Act were initially refused. In Oc-
ments from the Foundation could also be            tober 2007, the German government there-
made to compensate victims for material            fore adopted guidelines (Ghetto Work
losses.                                            Recognition Guidelines) under which vic-
     Seven international partner organisa-         tims of Nazi persecution could receive a
tions, coordinated by an international board       one-off payment of €2,000 for work in a
of trustees, were responsible for accepting        ghetto which did not constitute forced
and examining claims. The final application        labour and which had not yet been recog-
deadline was 31 December 2002. The pay-            nised under social insurance law. However,
ments were completed in early 2007. New            payments under the Ghetto Pension Act and
applications may no longer be filed.               the Ghetto Work Recognition Guidelines
     In total, more than 1.7 million people,       were mutually exclusive. Those whose work
including 1.66 million forced labourers, re-       in a ghetto had been recognised as forced
ceived payments. Of the Foundation’s capi-         labour and who had already received com-
tal, €4.37 billion was disbursed for payments      pensation for it from the Foundation for Re-
to former forced labourers.                        membrance, Responsibility and the Future
     Following the end of the payments,            did not qualify for payment, either. The final
EVZ’s endowment has, as provided section           application deadline was 31 December 2011.
2(2) of the Foundation Act, been used to               The revision of the Ghetto Work
support international projects that serve in-      Recognition Guidelines of 20 July 2011
tercultural understanding, the interests of        (Federal Gazette No. 110 of 26 July 2011,
survivors, youth exchanges, social justice,        p. 2624) removed the link between the pay-
remembering the danger of totalitarian sys-        ment in recognition of work in a ghetto and
tems and tyranny, and international cooper-        the receipt of a pension under the Ghetto
ation on humanitarian issues.                      Pension Act with retroactive effect. As a
     Further information on EVZ can be             consequence, the fact that work in a ghetto
found online at www.stiftung-evz.de (see           has been taken into account under social
also Annex 7, VII).                                security law now no longer precludes a one-
                                                   off payment being made in recognition of
                                                   ghetto work.
Page 14   History of German provisions relating to compensation
          and the consequences of the Second World War

                             The First Act to Amend the Ghetto Pen-         out in guidelines that were published in the
                         sions Act, which entered into force on             Federal Gazette on 14 October 2015 (Federal
                         1 August 2014, allows payments to be               Gazette, official section, 14 October 2015, B1).
                         granted with broad retroactive effect, as far
                         back as 1 July 1997.
                             Under a German-Polish agreement that
                                                                            1.17 Transforming
                         was concluded on 5 December 2014 and                    “Wiedergutmachung”
                         came into effect on 1 June 2015, recipients in
                         Poland are now also eligible for pensions.         Seventy-five years have passed since the end
                             Since July 2017, applicants have also been     of the Second World War.
                         entitled to a one-off payment of €1,500 un-            To this day, individual compensation
                         der section 2(2) of the Ghetto Work Recog-         payments are still being made to persons
                         nition Guidelines if their application to the      who experienced personal persecution and
                         German pension authority (Deutsche Rent-           injury as a result of National Socialist in-
                         enversicherung) was rejected only because          justice in accordance with section 1 of the
                         the general qualifying period set out in sec-      Federal Compensation Act. However, de-
                         tion 50(1) of the Sixth Book of the Social Se-     mographic developments mean that in the
                         curity Code was not fulfilled.                     foreseeable future, these active and personal
                             The guidelines are implemented by a            reparations to the survivors of the Holo-
                         dedicated working group at the Federal             caust, the Romani genocide and Nazi terror
                         Office for Central Services and Unresolved         will come to an end.
                         Property Issues in Berlin (see Annex 7, I).            For national and international as well as
                                                                            political and sociopolitical reasons, the Ger-
                                                                            man government is of the firm opinion that
                         1.16 Payment to former                             this should not mark the end of compen-
                              Soviet prisoners of war                       sation (Wiedergutmachung) in the sense of
                                                                            drawing a line under Germany’s activities in
                              in recognition of their                       this area.
                              treatment in German                               Rather, against a backdrop of increasing
                                                                            anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial, there
                              detention                                     now needs to be a greater focus on what
                                                                            happened before and after 1945, on how the
                         The German Bundestag decided on                    young democracy of the Federal Republic
                         21 May 2015 that former Soviet prisoners of        of Germany dealt with its National Socialist
                         war should receive a symbolic payment in           past, what lessons were learned and are be-
                         recognition of their time in German deten-         ing learned from the crimes against human-
                         tion. Members of the Soviet armed forces who       ity committed by the National Socialist re-
                         were detained as prisoners of war by Germany       gime, and how this can be communicated to
                         in the Second World War (during the period         future generations in a meaningful and last-
                         from 22 June 1941 to 8 May 1945) could re-         ing way. Compensation for National Social-
                         ceive a one-off payment of €2,500. The ap-         ist injustice is thereby shifting from a pro-
                         plication deadline was 30 September 2017.          gramme of active assistance for the victims
                         There was no legal entitlement to the pay-         of persecution towards activities that focus
                         ment; claims were tied to the individual recip-    on communicating the ways in which Ger-
                         ient and could not be transferred or inherited.    many has taken responsibility for its past.
                         The heirs of former Soviet prisoners of war
                         were not eligible to apply. The details were set
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 15

    Since the government’s firm foreign
policy principles and its public stance on
certain domestic policy and sociopolitical
issues are – and will be – difficult to com-
municate without reference to its continued
responsibility for the crimes committed be-
fore 1945, it will be necessary to draw more
strongly on the restitution and compensa-
tion records of victims of the National So-
cialist regime.
    As the Holocaust recedes further into
the past and active compensation claims de-
cline, and given that today there are gener-
ations growing up in Germany who, as a re-
sult of their migrant backgrounds, have no
family/regional or cultural links to the Na-
tional Socialist era, it is becoming ever more
important to shine a light on these records.
    Since 2017, the Federal Ministry of Fi-
nance has therefore been dedicating itself
increasingly to the follow-up tasks of com-
pensation for National Socialist injustice.
For example, Germany aims to establish a
digital platform to provide access to all res-
titution and compensation records which
are held in various locations throughout
Germany and abroad. Hundreds of thou-
sands of individual case files contain de-
tailed records of the victims of National So-
cialist injustice. In these records, the victims
describe the persecution they experienced
as well as their family histories, including
names, dates and locations, the names of
perpetrators and other victims, and much
more. The German government aims to
make all of these records fully and uni-
formly accessible in the future. They are in-
valuable not only for academic research and
for the relatives and descendants of the vic-
tims and survivors, but also for the purposes
of Holocaust education.
Seite 16

                II. Extra-statutory federal compensation
                    payments

           2.1 Hardship provision                             apply to anyone who had already received
                                                              compensation from another source or who
               for victims of                                 was eligible for compensation under a com-
               pseudo-medical                                 prehensive agreement between the Federal
                                                              Republic of Germany and one of various Eu-
               experiments                                    ropean states (see section 1.10). Due to the
                                                              particular cruelty of the pseudo-medical ex-
                                                              periments, the provision’s area of applica-
           Persons who had suffered damage to their           tion, which was originally limited to certain
           health due to the pseudo-medical experi-           territories, was extended by a subsequent
           ments carried out in several National So-          Cabinet decision of 22 June 1960 to include
           cialist concentration camps were entitled          assistance for victims of human experiments
           to compensation for the damage caused to           who live in states with which the Federal Re-
           body or health. They initially qualified un-       public of Germany did not have diplomatic
           der Land legislation and subsequently un-          relations at that time. Claims by nationals of
           der the Additional Federal Compensation            these states (Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugo-
           Act of 1953, superseded by the Federal Com-        slavia, Hungary and Romania) were exam-
           pensation Act of 1956, and were also entitled      ined individually on behalf of the German
           to compensation from a special fund under          Government by a neutral commission of the
           Article V of the Final Federal Compensation        International Committee of the Red Cross
           Act of 1965.                                       (ICRC) in Geneva that had been established
               In a Cabinet decision of 26 July 1951, the     for this purpose. Compensation was granted
           federal government had already established         from the funds made available by the Ger-
           a hardship provision for victims of human          man government.
           experiments who had not been harmed on                 In an effort to provide compensation for
           the grounds of political opposition, race, re-     the victims of experiments as quickly as pos-
           ligion or ideology, did not fulfil the statutory   sible, the German government, in agreement
           residence or qualifying date requirements, or      with the ICRC, concluded comprehensive
           had failed to meet the application deadline.       agreements with Yugoslavia, Czechoslova-
           This consisted of a one-off payment in cases       kia, Hungary and Poland for the benefit of
           of particular hardship. Due to its strictly        those applicants who had not yet received
           subsidiary nature, as confirmed by rulings         compensation but could expect a decision in
           by the highest court, this provision did not       their favour.
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 17

2.2 Hardship Fund for those                         Applications may be submitted to the
    not of the Jewish faith 		                  Federal Ministry of Finance (Bonn office);
                                                there is no need to fill out a form (for con-
    who were persecuted on                      tact details see Annex 7, III). There is no le-
    racial grounds                              gal entitlement to payments. Payments are
                                                strictly tied to the individual recipient and
A fund for those who are not of the Jew-        cannot be inherited or transferred.
ish faith but were nonetheless persecuted           Payments under the fund can be pro-
as Jews under the National Socialist regime     vided to organisations running old people’s
(HNG Fund) was established in 1952, even        homes or other homes if these organisations
before the Luxembourg Agreement. This           make a long-term commitment to provide
group of people also suffered persecution,      a certain requisite number of places in their
as the Nazis persecuted Jews on racial rather   homes to those eligible for payments.
than religious grounds and therefore also
targeted those who were not of the Jewish
faith but were regarded as Jews under the
                                                2.3 Extra-statutory
National Socialist race theory.                     provisions for
    Payments from the fund (in the version
of 15 September 1966; Federal Gazette No.           Jewish victims
178 of 22 September 1966) may be granted
to individuals who were persecuted because      After the application deadline under the Fi-
of their Jewish origins as defined by the       nal Federal Compensation Act had expired
Nuremberg Laws of 1935 or to near relatives     at the end of 1969, special cases of hardship
who were also adversely affected by perse-      continued to emerge where applicants were
cution. Those who are/were members of the       not eligible for payments because they had
Jewish faith at the time of persecution or at   missed the deadline. Moreover, various East-
the time of the decision on their claim for     ern European countries introduced emigra-
compensation are not eligible. This is in or-   tion opportunities for Jewish citizens in the
der to distinguish these victims from those     late 1970s, as a result of which significant
who fall under the responsibility of the Jew-   numbers of Jewish victims of Nazi persecu-
ish Claims Conference, which represents the     tion were able to emigrate from these coun-
interests of members of the Jewish faith.       tries to Israel. Under the provisions applica-
    Payments from the fund may be granted       ble at the time, people in this group did not
either in the form of one-off or ongoing        qualify for compensation. For this reason,
assistance. The factors taken into consid-      the Knesset demanded changes in German
eration include the gravity and impact of       compensation provisions. In a resolution of
the persecution as well as the financial and    14 December 1979 (Bundestag printed doc-
personal circumstances of the applicant and     ument 8/3511), the German Bundestag re-
of any relatives legally obliged to provide     quested the Federal Government to enact
support to him/her. The amount of the on-       hardship guidelines to enable this group of
going assistance payments is determined         victims to receive support. Under the en-
by guideline figures which are regularly ad-    suing guidelines of 3 October 1980 (Federal
justed in line with general economic trends.    Gazette No. 192 of 14 October 1980), Jewish
One-off assistance is generally granted to      victims of National Socialist persecution
cover the cost of living, specific costs in-    can receive a one-off payment of DM 5,000
curred by illness which are not otherwise       (€2,556.46) through the Jewish Claims Con-
covered, or for the acquisition of household    ference (JCC).
articles or clothing.
Page 18   Extra-statutory federal compensation payments

                            Since 1992, the guidelines have formed            In principle, if one of the two forms of
                        part of what is known as the Article 2 Agree-     compensation is approved, it rules out re-
                        ment. It was concluded with the JCC under         ceiving the other. One-off payments from
                        Article 2 of the supplementary agreement to       German sources and ongoing assistance
                        the Unification Treaty between the Federal        payments are not mutually exclusive. The
                        Republic of Germany and the former Ger-           Article 2 Agreement now also covers assis-
                        man Democratic Republic and deals with            tance under a January 1998 agreement gov-
                        the compensation of Jewish victims of Nazi        erning compensation for Jewish victims liv-
                        persecution who have not yet received any         ing in Central and Eastern Europe (the JCC’s
                        payments. In 2012, precisely twenty years af-     former Central and Eastern European Fund,
                        ter the Agreement was originally concluded,       or CEEF).
                        the arrangements that had been made until             Ongoing assistance is granted for the
                        then were documented in a revised version.        duration of the financial distress. Pensions
                        Under this agreement, Jewish victims of           provided on account of old age, reduced
                        National Socialist persecution who were           earning capacity or death and comparable
                        directly affected by National Socialist vio-      payments are not taken into account when
                        lence as defined in section 2 of the Federal      calculating income.
                        Compensation Act, or those who lost their             There is no legal entitlement to assistance
                        parents to National Socialist violence (child     under the Article 2 Agreement. Payments are
                        victims of persecution), and who have re-         strictly tied to the individual recipient and
                        ceived no compensation payments to date,          cannot be inherited or transferred. They can-
                        can receive a one-off payment of €2,556.46.       not be paid out to third parties. An exception
                        Claims under the hardship fund can also be        applies to surviving spouses or, if the spouse
                        made by individuals who were not yet born         is also deceased, to surviving children as
                        at the time of the persecution, but suffered      joint beneficiaries in cases where the victim
                        in the womb from their pregnant mother’s          dies after submitting an application but be-
                        persecution.                                      fore a decision is reached. In such cases, the
                            In addition to one-off payments, the          payment is capped at €2,556.
                        Agreement also covers ongoing monthly                 It is necessary to provide proof of en-
                        payments for Jewish victims of National So-       titlement. Should this not be possible, the
                        cialist persecution who are in financial dis-     entitlement can be substantiated in a suit-
                        tress and, in addition,                           able and plausible way. The payments can
                        • were detained in a concentration camp           be refused in full or in part if the applicant
                        or ghetto as described in section 42(2) of the    resorted to improper means or caused, en-
                        Federal Compensation Act or                       couraged or allowed the submission of in-
                        • lived under degrading conditions ei-            correct or misleading information, either
                        ther in hiding or in illegality under a false     through wilful intent or gross negligence. In
                        identity.                                         such cases, payments may be claimed back in
                        A list of prison camps for the purposes of        whole or in part.
                        the Article 2 Agreement with the JCC can be       The JCC was tasked with distributing the
                        found at www.bundesfinanzministerium.de           funds provided by Germany. The JCC has
                        /Haftstaetten;                                    sole responsibility for making decisions in
                        a list of ghettos (in German only) is available   individual cases, based on the criteria set
                        at www.bundesfinanzministerium.de/                out in the agreement. Applications should
                        Ghettoliste.                                      be addressed to the JCC’s offices (see Annex
                                                                          7, V).
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 19

    The Federal Ministry of Finance con-         2.4 Compensation for
ducts regular talks with the JCC about the
                                                     non-Jewish victims
implementation of the agreement with
the aim of adjusting the entitlement to          The German Government made provisions
payments.                                        for non-Jewish victims that are similar to
    In recent years, the need for home nurs-     the provisions for Jewish victims. These are
ing and medical care for the elderly survi-      set out in the guidelines on payments to
vors of the Holocaust has increased par-         non-Jewish victims of persecution to com-
ticularly strongly. That is why the JCC also     pensate for hardship in individual cases
receives funds under the Article 2 Agree-        (adopted on 26 August 1981 and amended
ment for the purpose of maintaining and          on 7 March 1988), known as the Compensa-
improving nursing and care options, espe-        tion Reserve Fund, or WDF (Federal Gazette
cially care in their own homes, for Jewish       No. 55 of 19 March 1988).
victims of persecution as defined in section         Under these provisions, non-Jewish vic-
1 of the Federal Compensation Act.               tims of persecution who suffered damage to
    Following intensive discussions in con-      their health as a result of National Socialist
nection with the 80th anniversary of the         injustice or who were prosecuted because
Kindertransport, the Federal Ministry of Fi-     of their political opposition to National So-
nance and the JCC agreed on a one-off sym-       cialism or on the grounds of race, religion
bolic payment of €2,500 for Kindertransport      or ideology (sections 1 and 2 of the Federal
evacuees.                                        Compensation Act) but were not eligible for
    The term Kindertransport (“children’s        statutory compensation payments for for-
transport”) refers to an evacuation opera-       mal reasons could receive one-off payments
tion which began following the Reichspo-         of up to €2,556.46 and, in special cases, on-
gromnacht on 9 November 1938. Around             going assistance.
10,000 Jewish children travelled without         The following constitute special cases:
their parents from Germany and territories        •   Detainment in a concentration camp as
that had been annexed or occupied by Ger-             defined by the Federal Compensation
many to safe countries. Most of the journeys          Act for at least three months; individual
occurred before the war began on 1 Septem-            reviews are possible in cases of shorter
ber 1939, and the main destination was the            imprisonment.
United Kingdom.
                                                  •   Detainment in a prison camp or life in
    The one-off payment is intended to rec-
                                                      camp-like conditions for at least three
ognise the particular suffering of these chil-
                                                      months; individual reviews are possible
dren, who were forced to leave their families
                                                      in cases of shorter imprisonment.
in peacetime. In many cases, they never saw
their families again.                             •   Life in hiding in degrading or
    Here, too, the JCC was tasked with dis-           particularly difficult conditions or in
tributing the funds provided by Germany.              illegality for at least four months if this
The JCC decides on individual cases, on the           led to permanent damage to health and
basis of jointly agreed criteria. Applications        a disability of at least 50%.
for this payment should also be addressed
to the JCC’s offices (see Annex 7, V).               Ongoing assistance under the Compen-
                                                 sation Reserve Fund can be granted only to
                                                 German citizens who live in Germany or to
                                                 foreign citizens of German origin as defined
                                                 in the Federal Expellees Act.
Page 20   Extra-statutory federal compensation payments

                           There is no legal entitlement to pay-
                        ments from the Compensation Reserve
                        Fund. Payments are strictly tied to the indi-
                        vidual recipient and cannot be inherited or
                        transferred.
                           Claims under these guidelines are pro-
                        cessed by the Federal Ministry of Finance
                        (Bonn office; see Annex 7, III).
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 21

     III. Compensation under the
          General Act Regulating Compensation
          for War-Induced Losses

3.1 Government guidelines                        ther because the victim missed the relevant
    on hardship                                  deadline or for other reasons.
                                                     Those eligible for payments include
    compensation to victims                      victims of forced sterilisation and the eu-
    of National Socialist                        thanasia programme as well as individuals
                                                 who were identified by the National Social-
    injustice under the                          ist state or party as ‘work-shy’, ‘refusing to
                                                 work’, ‘asocial’, homosexual, ‘criminal’ and
    General Act Regulating                       ‘vagrant’ and who suffered National Social-
    Compensation for                             ist oppression for this reason. Victims of
                                                 psychiatric persecution and members of the
    War-Induced Losses                           youth resistance movement also fall into
                                                 this category. Lawfully imposed penalties
The German government guidelines on              are deemed to constitute injustice if they
hardship compensation to victims of Na-          were unusually harsh, taking the circum-
tional Socialist injustice under the General     stances of the time and of war into account.
Act Regulating Compensation for War-In-          Payments are also made to persons who
duced Losses were issued on 7 March 1988         were imprisoned between 1933 and 1945
and revised on 28 March 2011 (Federal Ga-        provided that the imprisonment was based
zette of 15 October 2014, p. 1229). They stip-   on a penal decision that was subsequently
ulate that compensation must be provided         reversed by law.
to persons who were not victims of perse-            Payments can be granted only to Ger-
cution as defined in section 1 of the Federal    man citizens or, in the case of individuals
Compensation Act, but who, due to their          who are not German citizens or who ac-
physical or mental constitution or to their      quired their citizenship after 8 May 1945,
personal or social behaviour, were either in-    to those who are of German ethnic origin
dividually or collectively targeted by the Na-   as defined in sections 1 and 6 of the Federal
tional Socialist regime, and as a result suf-    Expellees Act. An individual must either be
fered injustice. These payments are intended     domiciled, or have his or her permanent
to mitigate hardship that persists despite       place of residence, in the Federal Republic
the provisions of the General Act Regulating     of Germany at the time he or she submits an
Compensation for War-Induced Losses, ei-         application for compensation.
Page 22   Extra-statutory federal compensation payments

                            Compensation is provided in the form of      3.2 Payments to victims of
                        one-off payments (up to €2,556.46), ongoing
                                                                             the National Socialist
                        monthly payments, and additional ongoing
                        payments (in individual cases).                      military judiciary
                            Persons who suffered significant dam-
                        age to their body or health, victims of forced   Individuals who were convicted of ‘incit-
                        sterilisation and victims of the euthanasia      ing disobedience’, ‘conscientious objection’
                        programme are entitled to a one-off pay-         or ‘desertion’ during the Second World
                        ment of €2,556.46. Persons who suffered          War were eligible for a one-off payment
                        deprivation of liberty receive a one-off         of €3,834.68 in addition to any payments
                        payment of €76.69 for each month (or part        received or due under the guidelines de-
                        thereof) of detainment, up to a maximum of       scribed in the preceding section of this bro-
                        €2,556.46.                                       chure. Provision for this payment was made
                            Victims of forced sterilisation and those    in the Instructions for the Final Settlement
                        affected directly by euthanasia measures are     of the Rehabilitation and Compensation of
                        entitled to ongoing monthly assistance in        Individuals Convicted During the Second
                        addition to the one-off payment.                 World War for ‘Inciting Disobedience’, ‘Con-
                            Additional ongoing payments can be           scientious Objection’ or ‘Desertion’ of 17
                        granted in certain exceptional cases in          December 1997 (Federal Gazette No. 2 of 6
                        which there are special circumstances that       January 1998), most recently amended on 30
                        make further assistance necessary and the        December 1998 (Federal Gazette No. 8 of 14
                        victim is in financial distress.                 January 1999).
                            Assistance under these guidelines strictly       It was introduced following a sugges-
                        tied to the individual recipient and cannot      tion made on 15 May 1997 by the Bundestag
                        be inherited or transferred. In exceptional      committee on legal affairs. The Bundestag
                        cases, assistance may also be granted to sur-    had determined that, in the above-men-
                        viving spouses, if they were significantly af-   tioned cases, the judgements passed by the
                        fected by the injustice or its consequences.     Wehrmacht judiciary during the Second
                            Children whose parents were both             World War were unjust under rule-of-law
                        killed due to a National Socialist oppressive    principles. Compensation was granted in
                        measure may receive a one-off payment of         more than 500 cases. The application dead-
                        €2,556.46 provided that, at the time of their    line was 31 December 1999.
                        parents’ death, they had not yet reached the
                        age of twenty-one or, if they were still un-
                        dergoing education and were entitled to
                        maintenance, they had not yet reached the
                        age of twenty-seven. All assistance is pro-
                        vided in compensation for the injustice suf-
                        fered. Applications for assistance covered by
                        the guidelines on hardship compensation to
                        victims of National Socialist injustice under
                        the General Act Regulating Compensation
                        for War-Induced Losses should be addressed
                        to the Central Customs Authority’s service
                        centre in Cologne (see Annex 7, II).
Compensation for National Socialist Injustice   Page 23

     IV. Provisions for the Länder in former
         East Germany

4.1 Compensation Pension                       4.2 Extra-statutory
    Act                                            provisions based on the
The provisions on honorary and depend-             Compensation Pension
ants’ pensions for victims of National So-
cialism from the former GDR were revised
                                                   Act
in the Compensation Pension Act of 22 April
1992 (Federal Law Gazette I, p. 906), which    Compensation is also available to those
came into force on 1 May 1992. This new        who are victims as defined in section 1 of
legislation was necessary because the legal    the Federal Compensation Act but are not
basis for honorary pensions paid out in the    entitled to a compensation pension under
former GDR to fighters against fascism and     the Compensation Pension Act and were, or
the victims of fascism, as well as their de-   are, unable to receive payments under other
pendants, largely ceased to exist on 31 De-    compensation regulations on account of
cember 1991.                                   living in the former GDR. This is governed
    As well as establishing that payment       by a supplementary provision that also en-
of honorary pensions already in existence      tered into force on 1 May 1992 in the form
on 30 April 1992 be continued in the form      of German government guidelines based on
of compensation pensions (the amount of        section 8 of the Compensation Pension Act
which was modified), the Compensation          (Federal Gazette No. 95 of 21 May 1992, p.
Pension Act also gives victims of National     4185). Those who left the former GDR after
Socialism who were refused an honorary         30 June 1969 and started living in the terri-
pension on unconstitutional grounds by         tory of the Federal Republic of Germany as
the GDR agency responsible at the time, or     it was on 2 October 1990 are also entitled to
whose pension was initially approved but       submit an application.
subsequently withdrawn, a right to submit a
new application.
The Federal Insurance Office (Bundesver-
sicherungsamt) is responsible for imple-
menting this law (see Annex 7, IV).
You can also read