http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22840398-2703,00.html
Archive of Nazi horrors opened November 29, 2007 AMSTERDAM: A vast archive of German war records opened its doors to the public last night, giving historians and Holocaust survivors who have waited more than 60 years access to concentration camp records detailing Nazi horrors. The 11 countries that oversee the archive of the International Tracing Service have finished ratifying an accord unsealing about 50 million pages kept in the German town of Bad Arolsen, ITS director Reto Meister said last night. "The process is complete," said Mr Meister, whose organisation is part of the International Committee of the Red Cross. "The doors are open." Greece was the last of the 11 to formally file its ratification papers with the German Foreign Ministry. "It's a relief. It took a long time - far too long," said Paul Shapiro of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, which has lobbied since 2001 to pry open the ITS archive. Until now, the archive had been used exclusively to trace missing persons, reunite families and provide documentation to victims of Nazi persecution to support compensation claims. The US also has referred to the ITS for background checks on immigrants it suspected of lying about their past. Mr Meister said the ITS received 50 applications this month alone from academics and research organisations seeking to examine the archive - including documents of communications among Nazi officials, camp registrations, transportation lists, slave labour files, death lists and postwar displaced persons files. The records are unlikely to change the general knowledge of the Holocaust and the Nazi era, probably the most intensely researched 12-year period of the 20th century. But its depth of detail and documentation will add texture and detail to history's worst genocide, and is likely to fuel a revival of academic interest in the Holocaust. The archive's index refers to 17.5 million people in its 25km of files. Allied forces began collecting the documents even before the end of the war, and eventually entrusted them to the Red Cross. The archive has been governed since 1955 by a commission that has normally met once a year. Its members are the US, Britain, Germany, Israel, Poland, France, Italy, Belgium, Greece, Luxembourg and The Netherlands. AP
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