Ex-Nazi Acquitted Over War Crimes

Ex-Nazi acquitted over war crimes

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4541636.stm

12/19/2005

A Munich court has acquitted an 88-year-old man who had been accused of murdering civilians in Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia during World War II.

The court could not find evidence linking Ladislav Niznansky to three Nazi massacres in 1945, in which 164 people died.

The killings took place after a failed uprising against Slovakia's pro-Nazi wartime government.

Mr Niznansky was in a Nazi unit that hunted down Slovak partisans and Jews.

The joint German-Slovak unit was called Edelweiss. Mr Niznansky said he had been forced to join it after being captured by the Nazis.

He had been charged with ordering the shooting of 146 civilians in Slovakia in January 1945 and the murder of 18 Jews found hiding a month later.

Cold War emigre
A Czechoslovak court found him guilty in 1962 and sentenced him to death in absentia.

By then he had fled to West Germany from communist Czechoslovakia and got a job with US-financed Radio Free Europe in Munich. He became a German citizen in 1996.

German authorities began their investigation in 2001 after a request from Slovakia.

Mr Niznansky was accused of ordering the execution of the entire population of two villages - Ostry Grun and Klak - that had been helping the partisans. Most victims were women and children.

But he was released from police custody in October 2004, after testimony from a witness was deemed unreliable.

The Munich court awarded him compensation on Monday.

During the trial he expressed regret over the Nazi killings of civilians.