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Friday December 8, 2006

Emotions high over call for Holocaust exhibit

by toby axelrod
jta

berlin | Pressure is mounting on Germany’s national railway to approve a traveling exhibit about the deportation of Jewish children during World War II — but it may take an act of the German Parliament to make it happen.

The debate — which has pitted mainstream politicians of every stripe against the head of Deutsche Bahn, a private company whose shares are owned by the government — underscores the high emotions regarding questions of Holocaust remembrance more than 60 years after the end of World War II.

Those who favor the proposed traveling exhibit suggest that too many Germans would avoid the truth if given the choice.

But “it’s the duty of the younger generation to preserve the memory of these events, including the fate of deported children throughout Europe,” Transportation Minister Wolfgang Tiefensee said in an email interview.

The exhibit, called “11,000 Jewish Children — With the Reichsbahn to Death,” was seen in 18 French rail stations. Its creator, journalist and Nazi hunter Beate Klarsfeld of Paris, hopes to see it open in Germany in early 2007.

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