Belated
Settlement for
Crimes of
French SNCF,
Immunity in
Question?
By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
December 5 --
From
1941 through
1944 French
state-owned
railroad
company SNCF
transported
76,000 people
to
concentration
camps -- over
11,000 of them
children --
charging the
Nazi-controlled
government
third class
fares although
the
accommodations
were in cattle
cars.
Better
late than
never:
The
United States
and France
have reached
an agreement
for
substantial
compensation
in connection
with the
wrongs
suffered by
Holocaust
victims
deported from
France.
The
centerpiece of
the agreement
is a $60
million lump
sum payment by
France to the
United States,
which will
distribute the
funds to
eligible
claimants.
The
compensation
is based on
France’s
recognition
that
Americans,
Israelis, and
other
foreigners who
were deported
during the
Holocaust have
not been able
to gain access
to the French
pension
program.
The
signing
ceremony will
take place on
Monday,
December 8,
2014 at 11:30
a.m. in the
Department of
State Treaty
Room. On
the U.S. side,
the agreement
will be signed
by Ambassador
Stuart E.
Eizenstat, the
U.S. lead
negotiator and
the Secretary
of State’s
Special
Adviser on
Holocaust
Issues.
For France,
the agreement
will be signed
by the lead
French
negotiator and
Ambassador for
Human Rights,
Patrizianna
Sparacino-Thiellay.
Back
on November
16, 2011 Inner
City Press
reported:
Now
when SNCF is
sued for these
crimes against
humanity, the
company raises
the defense of
soverign
immunity. The
logic is that
since Nicholas
Sarkozy can't
be sued by his
victims
including
recent ones
from weapons
drops in Libya
and reprisals
in Cote
d'Ivoire,
neither can
SNCF be sued,
even by
Holocaust
survivors.
Wednesday
on Capitol
Hill in the
Rayburn House
Office
Building, the
House
Committee on
Foreign
Affairs heard
from Holocaust
survivors, in
support of
H.R. 1193, the
Holocaust Rail
Justice Act,
which would
prevent
foreign
sovereign
immunity from
being raised
as a defense
by the French
rail company
SNCF in a
class action
law suit
brought
against them
by Holocaust
survivors.
The
Committee
heard, this is
not the type
of situation
foreign
sovereign
immunity was
ever meant to
apply to.
Chairperson
Ileana
Ros-Lehtinen
moved things
along, so the
Committee got
testimony from
Leo Bretholz,
who survived
only by
jumping from a
SNCF train
bound for
Auschwitz
carrying one
thousand other
victims. Later
he settled in
Baltimore.
SNCF train,
cattle cars to
Auschwitz
& impunity
not shown
Bretholz
said SNCF was
paid by the
Nazis "per
head and per
kilometer." He
submitted into
the record an
invoice SNCF
submitted
"after the
Nazis were
gone." He
described how
families were
split up. For
the whole
trip, SNCF
gave "one
piece of
triangle
cheese, one
piece of bread
and no water."
An
elderly woman
on crutches
told him, "You
must do it, if
you get out,
maybe you can
tell the
story." He
managed to
bend the bars
of the windows
of the cattle
car and got
out. Of SNCF
convoy number
42, only five
survived.
For
SNCF, he said,
"it's all
about money."
Seventy years
is enough, he
concluded.
Yes, it is.
Now in
December 2014
we ask, why
are other
immunities
called
absolute?
We'll have
more on this.
, 
