Last week Erich Priebke died, someone you might probably only have heard of if you are German or Italian, he was notorious for his involvment as an officer in the SS during the late German occupation of Italy in 1944.
Most notorious of all is his involvement in the Ardeatian massacre in Rome in which 335 people were murdered. At the end of Mussolinis regime in Italy, the Italian goverment were negotiating a deal with the allied forces. The Germans reacted to this by sending troops into Italy, reinforcing Mussolinis regime and enforcing the same brutal systems of supression under the leadership of the SS and Gestapo, which they had used in all other occupied countries. The massacre was the result of increasing resistance against the German occupation to which the Germans reacted by randomly slaughtering civilians all throughout Italy. Priebke was an officer in the SS and has been proven to have personaly organised and even personaly executed up to 12 civilians in the previously mentioned massacre.
After WW2 Priebke managed to flee to Argentenia, the then fascist regime running Argentinia welcomed many nazi warcriminals and gave them safe harbor. After the collapse of the Argentinian regime and the reinstallment of diplomatic releationships between Argentinia and Germany, Italy,. Priebke was extradited to Germany and later to Italy to stand trial for his crimes and was sentenced to life in prison which due to health issues was changed to house arrest.
After his death last week, Germany refused to have his body transported and buried to/in Germany, fearing that his grave might turn into a sight of pilgremage for fascists.
In the end a ultra conservative (fascist) catholic group agreed to have a burrial for the warcriminal in Italy. The burrial was accompanied by various fascists and fanatic ultra conservative catholics protecting the ceremony from being disrupted by people who protested against the burrial.
When reading about this in the news, I couldnt help but remember that when the Nürnberg trials were over and the sentenced warcriminals had been hanged, and when Eichman was hanged after his trial in Israel, their corpses were burnt and their ashes scattered in the Elbe (german river) and in the mederteranian ocean. Which was certainly the best solution and prevented future attempts of creating a "fascist site for pilgremage". Yet today it seems as if various countries were completly ok with having warcriminals burried and sometimes even get graves almoust ment to be memorial sights (Milosovice).
I would like to know what you think of this.
Most notorious of all is his involvement in the Ardeatian massacre in Rome in which 335 people were murdered. At the end of Mussolinis regime in Italy, the Italian goverment were negotiating a deal with the allied forces. The Germans reacted to this by sending troops into Italy, reinforcing Mussolinis regime and enforcing the same brutal systems of supression under the leadership of the SS and Gestapo, which they had used in all other occupied countries. The massacre was the result of increasing resistance against the German occupation to which the Germans reacted by randomly slaughtering civilians all throughout Italy. Priebke was an officer in the SS and has been proven to have personaly organised and even personaly executed up to 12 civilians in the previously mentioned massacre.
After WW2 Priebke managed to flee to Argentenia, the then fascist regime running Argentinia welcomed many nazi warcriminals and gave them safe harbor. After the collapse of the Argentinian regime and the reinstallment of diplomatic releationships between Argentinia and Germany, Italy,. Priebke was extradited to Germany and later to Italy to stand trial for his crimes and was sentenced to life in prison which due to health issues was changed to house arrest.
After his death last week, Germany refused to have his body transported and buried to/in Germany, fearing that his grave might turn into a sight of pilgremage for fascists.
In the end a ultra conservative (fascist) catholic group agreed to have a burrial for the warcriminal in Italy. The burrial was accompanied by various fascists and fanatic ultra conservative catholics protecting the ceremony from being disrupted by people who protested against the burrial.
When reading about this in the news, I couldnt help but remember that when the Nürnberg trials were over and the sentenced warcriminals had been hanged, and when Eichman was hanged after his trial in Israel, their corpses were burnt and their ashes scattered in the Elbe (german river) and in the mederteranian ocean. Which was certainly the best solution and prevented future attempts of creating a "fascist site for pilgremage". Yet today it seems as if various countries were completly ok with having warcriminals burried and sometimes even get graves almoust ment to be memorial sights (Milosovice).
I would like to know what you think of this.
