Die Verbrechen der anderen : Auschwitz und der Auschwitz-Prozess der DDR: das Verfahren gegen den KZ-Arzt Dr. Horst Fischer

Describes the prosecution of Nazi war criminals in the Soviet Zone of occupation and in the GDR, commenting that the number of actual war criminals was small in proportion to those suspected of opposing the communist regime. Soon the GDR declared that it had completed the purge of Nazis. In 1965, however, it was discovered that a country doctor, Horst Fischer, had been an assistant to Wirths, the head physician at Auschwitz, as well as himself head physician at Monowitz. His discovery at the time of the Frankfurt Auschwitz trials enabled the GDR to compete with a highly publicized Auschwitz trial of its own. Fischer made a complete and detailed confession and expressed contrition. The East German security service permitted lawyers from the second Frankfurt Auschwitz trial to interrogate him in East Berlin; he helped incriminate several of the accused at that trial, especially the physician Gerhard Neubert. The GDR's representative in Frankfurt, Friedrich Karl Kaul, tried unsuccessfully to influence the Frankfurt tribunal to recognize the prime guilt of IG Farben. This became the central point of emphasis at the GDR trial - the concentration camp as an instrument of big industry (whose leaders occupied leading positions in West Germany) in cooperation with the SS. Fischer's death sentence and his execution in July 1966 aroused protest in the East German population. doctoral,Freie Universität, Berlin,2004 406 pages, 16 unnumbered pages of plates : 26 illustrations ; 24 cm.