Nazi grandpa gets no pardon

berlin - The 96-year-old bookkeeper of Auschwitz has to go into the cell for four years. Oskar Gröning, who counted and managed the stolen money and the belongings of deported Jews, wanted the Federal Republic's pardon after his conviction. But justice in Lüneburg rejected his request yesterday- because of the mass murder of three hundred thousand people. Gröning hoped that he would not have to go into jail because of his high age and poor health.

Three years ago, Gröning was sentenced in the town of Lüneburg, near his home town, as a war criminal. The judge considered it proven that his work brought many tens of thousands of people, especially Jews, into the gas chambers: 'You were walking around the platform of the mass destruction camp with a pistol, where three trains with five thousand deportees arrived every day. 'They could not escape, while the very old German SS wanted to escape through grace.

The famous Auschwitz survivor Jules Schelvis from Amsterdam had told this newspaper before his death that he was happy 'that Gröning gets his deserved pay'. Schelvis also believed that Gröning did not have to go into prison because of his age, but the German judge was unrelenting. An objection from him to the Supreme Court was also swept aside recently.