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Should We Continue to Prosecute Nazi War Criminals?

The recent conviction of a 93-year-old Auschwitz guard reignited a debate about prosecuting the remaining few Nazi war criminals. Most observers call for a no-holds-barred hunt for the Holocaust perpetrators who have evaded justice for decades, but others point to their old age, legal issues and difficulty in proving the crimes, arguing that after nearly 80 years, the pursuit should come to a conclusion.

In the most recent case, German prosecutors charged Oskar Gröning, a former SS member, with at least 300,000 counts of accessory to murder while he was stationed at the Auschwitz concentration camp. Mr. Gröning, known as the “accountant of Auschwitz,” collected money from the luggage of newly arrived prisoners, which he would then turn over to the SS headquarters in Berlin, The Wall Street Journal reports.

The Gröning case is among 30 others, all against former Auschwitz-Birkenau guards, a result of a wide investigative push announced by German war-crime prosecutors in April.Whether they will be put on the stand depends on the investigation’s results and on the health of the accused.

Read entire article at NYT