IOM PAYS MAXIMUM AMOUNTS TO GERMAN INDUSTRY’S FORCED LABOURERS

Following a re-evaluation of the financial needs of all partner organizations and available additional funds, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) managed to obtain approximately 47% of the total of EUR 318 million interest accrued on the EUR 5 billion fund established by German industry and the German Government to pay compensation to slave and forced labourers and certain other victims of the Nazi regime.

The additional allocation of EUR 149 million, adopted by the Board of Trustees of the German Foundation “Remembrance, Responsibility and Future” at its meeting in Berlin earlier this week, enables IOM to pay the maximum compensation amounts under the German Foundation Act to victims of slave labour and to victims of forced labour in industry under the Nazi regime. Victims of slave labour will receive a total of EUR 7,669 and victims of forced labour in industry a total of EUR 2,556.

In addition, it was agreed that all surviving victims of “other personal injury”, including so-called medical experiments, would receive a top-up payment of EUR 2,450. So far, eligible personal injury victims have received EUR 4,243. With the additional payment the individual compensation for survivors amounts to almost EUR 6,700 or 87% of the maximum amount of EUR 7,669 under the German Foundation Act.

“While we are still not able to pay the maximum amounts to the heirs, we will now at least be able to pay them more than the minimum amounts set by the German Foundation’s Board of Trustees,” says Norbert Wühler, the new Director of IOM’s Claims Programmes. “With the help of our partners, it was ensured that all groups of claimants get a fair share of the interest accrued.”

Second instalment payments for slave and forced labour victims are scheduled to begin in March 2005. This will be followed by payments to legal successors/heirs.

Out of the 332,000 claims received under its German Forced Labour Compensation Programme (GFLCP), IOM has paid more than 90,000 claims. While 234,000 claimants were notified of negative decisions on their claims because they did not fulfill the criteria laid down in the German Foundation Act. The remaining claims were transferred to other partner organizations or were claims made by the same family.

As a partner organization of the German Foundation “Remembrance, Responsibility and Future”, IOM is in charge of processing claims of former slave and forced labourers and of making financial compensation available to them. The German law establishing the Foundation, the German Foundation Act, entered into force on 12 August 2000 and the German industry and German Government provided approximately EUR 2.56 billion each to the fund. IOM is responsible for non-Jewish claimants living in the so-called “rest of the world”, i.e. anywhere except for the Czech Republic, Poland and the republics of the former Soviet Union.

The filing deadline for submission of claims under this programme expired on 31 December 2001 and IOM is not accepting any more claims.

According to the German Foundation Act, any funds that the seven partner organizations have not been able to pay out by the end of September 2006 must be returned to the German Foundation “Remembrance, Responsibility and Future”. The programme will then be closed.