Auschwitz Committee wants German auction of Holocaust items scrapped

The International Auschwitz Committee (IAK) has called on an auction house in western Germany to cancel its auction of Holocaust artefacts scheduled for Monday.

The auction of personal documents belonging to victims of Nazi Germany is considered by Holocaust survivors and their relatives to be a "cynical and shameless undertaking," said IAK executive vice president Christoph Heubner in Berlin on Saturday.

The suffering of all those who were persecuted and murdered by the Nazis is being exploited for commercial gain, he said. Documents relating to persecution and the Holocaust belong to the families of those who were persecuted.

He said such documents should be displayed in museums or in exhibitions at memorial sites and not be degraded to commercial objects. "We call on those responsible at the auction house to show human decency and cancel the auction," said Heubner.

The Felzmann auction house in Neuss, near Dusseldorf, plans to start the auction on Monday under the title "The System of Terror Vol. II 1933–1945."

According to the IAK, items on offer include letters from concentration camps, Gestapo index cards and other documents from perpetrators. Many of the items contain personal information and the names of those affected.

The online catalogue includes an anti-Jewish propaganda poster and a Jewish star from the Buchenwald concentration camp with "signs of wear." The auction house could not be reached for comment.