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Court orders compensation for Holocaust victims' kin

Vaiju Naravane

Mr. Lipietz's father and his uncle were arrested by the Gestapo on suspicion of being Jewish

Paris: French member of the European Union Parliament Alain Lipietz and his sister Helene, now an elected official of France's Green Party, whose father and uncle were arrested by the Gestapo and interned by France's collaborationist Vichy regime during the Second World War, have won a historic judicial victory.

On May 8, 1944, Mr. Lipietz's father, who was 21 years old and his uncle a stripling lad of 15, were arrested by the Gestapo on suspicion of being Jewish and handed over to the Vichy police. They were transported by the French railways to be imprisoned at a camp in Drancy, near Paris, from where many prisoners were deported to Nazi death camps further afield.

Ground-breaking verdict

The family, of Polish origin, had been awarded French nationality sometime earlier. Their transport to Drancy in jam-packed cattle-wagons which took over 30 hours, and the months they spent in the internment camps left indelible scars on both the victims.

In a ground-breaking judgment, the administrative court in Toulouse ordered the French State and the national railway authority, the SNCF, to pay Euros 62,000 to the Lipietz family in damages.

The judges delivering the verdict took cognisance of the prejudice suffered by the victims as a result of "their interment in the prison in Toulouse following their arrest by the Gestapo on May 8, 1944, their transportation by the SNCF and their internment at the Drancy camp from May 11 to August 17, 1944."

Commenting the verdict, Mr. Alan Lipietz said: "The judges felt that the French administration, which could not have been ignorant of their transfer, facilitated an operation which was known to be a prelude to deportation. The court thus recognised that the French State and the SNCF did more than was asked of them by the Gestapo and their Nazi masters".

As if to add insult to injury, the SNCF charged the victims third class train fare and continued to claim the fare even after Liberation.

The Railways have decided to appeal against the court verdict.

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