Germany to prosecute 50 former Auschwitz guards

About 50 men in their 90s are to stand trial for their service as guards in the Auschwitz Nazi death camp during World War II.

The WAZ German news website reported that legal proceedings will be opened against the suspects who will be charged with accessory to murder, 

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The late proceedings, 68 years after the end of the war, have a precedent in John Demjanjuk's conviction in 2011.

Visitor in Auschwitz (Photo: Reuters)

A former guard in the Sobibor Nazi camp, Demjanjuk was sentenced to five years in prison for accessory to the murder of 28,060 Jews in 1943.

The cases against the 50 suspects lack eyewitnesses. Nevertheless, the Central Office for the Investigation of National Socialist Crimes (COINS) hopes written records from the Nazi period will suffice

for a conviction – as they did in Demjanjuk's case.

The chief prosecutor, Kurt Schrimm, told WAZ that the 50 guards were recruited from around Germany but didn't reveal their current whereabouts.

He noted that some of them may have escaped to South America with the aid of the Catholic Church.

According to WAZ, COINS has located since its founding in 1958 over 7,000 Nazi war criminals.

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