It is the account of the fiftythird meeting of the Central Office of the Plan. Funk received an account of this meeting. It is shown on the second line -Ministre d'empire Funk. to Marshal Milch because of his inability to be present at the meeting.
"Very honored and very dear Field Marshal:
"Unfortunately, the meetings of the Central Office of the Plan have always been set for dates when I am already engaged by other important meetings. So it is to my great regret that I shall be unable to be present Saturday at the meeting of the Central Office of the Plan, inasmuch as I have to speak on that day in Vienna in the course of a great demonstration in the honor of the Anniversary of the day of the Anschluss. Secretary Kayler will likewise be in Vienna on Friday and Saturday, where there will likewise be an important South-European conference, in which foreign delegates will participate and at which I must likewise speak.
"Under these conditions I beg you to be present as a representative to the meeting of the Central Office of the Plan and to have the Major General of Police, Brigade Chief of SS Ohlendorff, who is the permanent substitute."
THE PRESIDENT: Does this document tell us anything more than that the Defendant Funk was unable to be present?
MR. HERZOG: This document, Mr. President, which was given to me by my American colleagues, who asked me to use it in the case on obligatory labor, because they have not had time to use it in their charge against Funk, is presented to the Tribunal, to wit:
to prove that Funk was following the meetings of the Central Office of the Plan and that he had permanent representatives there whom he had represent him on all occasions and who, by their report, kept him in touch with the work of the Central Office of the Plan. That is why we present to the Tribunal this document on Defendant Funk. I shall continue the quote.
"Under these circumstances, I beg you to be present, as my representative, at the meeting of the Central Office of the Plan and to invite also the Major General of Police, Brigade Chief of the SS, Ohlendorff, who is the permanent substitute of the Secretary of State, Kayler. Mr. Ohlendorff will be an expert from the Cabinet of Kayler for questions of economy of consumption and Counsellor of State, Junke, for questions concerning external commerce." Defendant Sauckel, is shown by the mass deportation of workers. The principle of this deportation is a criminal one but the manner of its execution was even more criminals I shall submit the proof of this to the Tribunal, in laying before it, in succession, the methods of compulsory recruitment, its results and the conditions of deportation. Foreign delegations who have come to my aid in the preparation of my work, in particular, my colleague, M. Pierre Portal, attorney at the Bar of Lyons. be limited to the account of the recruiting of foreign labor in occupied territories of Western Europe. The deportation of workers coming from the East will be treated by my Soviet colleagues. commanders imposed requisitions of labor on the populations of the occupied territories. Fortification works considered necessary for the furtherance of military operations and guard duties, made necessary by the need of maintaining the security of the occupation troops, were carried out by the inhabitants of the occupied areas.
The labor requisitions affected not only individuals taken in islotation but entire groups. In France, for instance, they affected, in turn, groups of Indo-Chinese workers, workers from North Africa, foreign workers, and "Youth workshops." I produce in evidence an extract from the report on forced labor and the deportation of workers drawn up by the Institute of Market Analysis of the French Government. This report hears the Number 515 and I submit this to the Tribunal, under Number 22. This document, because of its importance, is present in the document book. I quote first of all page 17 of the French text and 17, likewise, of the German translation.
THE PRESIDENT: Is this it? (indicating)
MR. HERZOG: No, it is the document in the blue book, on page 17.
"6. The Forced Recruitment of Constituted Groups:
"Finally, a last procedure utilized by the Germans on a number of occasion during the whole course of the occupation for direct forced labor, as well as for indirect forced labor, the requisition of constituted groups already trained and disiplined and consequently an excellent contribution.
"(a) Indo-Chinese Labor: This formation of colonial workers had been intended from the beginning of the hostilities to satisfy the needs of French industry in non-specialized labor, recruited and under the control of officers and non-commissioned officers of the French Army, transformed into civilian functionaries after the month of July 1940. Indo-chinese labor was, from 1945 on, obliged to do forced labor, directly as well as indirectly, in a partial manner."
"The North African work between August 17 and November 6, 1942. The home country received two contingents of workers from North Africa; one composed 5,560 Algerians; the other 1,825 Moroccans. These workers Were immediately obliged to do direct forced labor, which brought the number of North African workers enrolled in the Todt organization to 17,582.
"(c) Foreign labor: The law of July 11, 1938, concerning the organization of the nation in time of war provided for the cases of foreigners living in France, obliging them to provide labor, enrolled by officers and non commissioned officers transformed to civilian functionaries by the law of the 9 October, 1940.
But the foreign labor was progressively subjected by the Germans to direct forced labor."
I skip the table and I read sub-paragraph (d).
"Youth workshops - 29 January, 1943. The labor staff of the German Armistice Commission in Paris made known that the Commander-in-Chief West, examined whether and under what forms the formations of French work might be called upon for the accomplishment of tasks important for both countries. A partial recruiting follows and the demands for young people in the workshops for direct labor follows." Europe, in the occupied territories of Western Europe. These requisitions were illegal. They were carried out by virtue of Article 52 of the Appendix to the Fourth Hague Convention. They did, in fact, systematically violate the letter and the spirit of the text of this international law.
What does Article 52 of the Appendix to the Fourth Hage Convention say? It is worded as follows: "Requisitions in kind and services shall not be demanded from municipalities or inhabitants except for the needs of the army of occupation. They shall be in proportion to the resources of the country. Such requisitions and services shall only be demanded on the authority of the commander of the locality occupied." by an army of occupation are expressly formulated. These terms are four in number:
1. The rendering of services can only be demanded for the needs of the army of occupation. All requisitions made for the general economic needs of the occupying power are thus forbidden.
2. Services demanded by way of requisition must not entail an obligation to take part in military operations against the country of those rendering them. The rendering of any service exacted in the interests of the war economy of the occupying power, all guard duties or exercise of military control is forbidden.
3. Services rendered in a given area must be in proportion to its economic resources, the development of which must bot be hampered.
It follows that any requisitioning of lable is contrary to international law if it results in the impeding of prevention of the normal utilization of the riches of the occupied country.
4. Finally, labor requisitions must, under the provisions of the second paragraph of Article 52, be carried out in the area of the locality under the administration of the occupation authority who has signed the requisition order. The transfer of conscripted workers from one part of the occupied area to another, and, even more, their deportation to the country of the occupied power are prohibited.
in the occupied areas did not honor the spirit of Article 52. They were carried out to satisfy either the needs of German economy or even the needs of military strategy of the enemy forces. They deliberately refused to acknowledge the need of ensuring facilities for a reasonable utilization of local resources; they finally took the form of migrations of workers. The case of those workers who were conscripted from all countries of Western Europe and formed an integral part of the Todt organization to help in building the system of fortifications known under the name of the "Atlantic Wall" may be taken as a typical example.
This violation of international agreements is a flagrant one; it called forth repeated protests from General Doyen, delegate of the French authorities with the German Armistice Commission. I ask the Tribunal to accept as evidence the letter of General Doyen, 25 May 1941. This letter constitutes Document 283, and it is placed before the Tribunal as session Document 23. I read:
"Wiesbaden, 25 May 1941. The General de Corps d'Armee Doyen, President of the French Delegation at the German Armistice Commission to Monsieur le General der Artillerie Vogl, President of the German Armistice Commission. "On several occasions, and notably in my letters No. 14,263/A.E. and 14,887/A.E. of 26 February and 8 March, I have had the honor of protesting to you against the vise in which the French labor was being called upon to be employed within the framework of the Todt organization in the execution of military work on the coast of Bretagne.
"I have today the duty of calling your attention to other cases in which the occupation authorities have recourse to the recruiting of French civilians to carry out services of a strictly military character, cases which are even more grave than those which I have already called to your attention.
"If, indeed, as concerns the workers engaged by the Todt organization, it may be argued that certain ones among them accepted voluntarily an employment for which they are being remunerated, although in practice most often they were not given the possibility of refusing this employment, this argument can by no means be invoked when the prefets themselves obliged at the expense of the departments and the communities of imposing guard services at important points, such as bridges, tunnels, works of art, telephone lines, munitions depots, and areas surrounding aviation fields.
"The accompanying note furnishes some examples of the guard services which thus have been imposed upon Frenchmen, services which before this were assumed by the German Army and which normally called upon them since it is a question of participating in watches or of preserving the German Army from risks flowing from the state of war existing between Germany and Great Britain." were anxious that their orders regarding the requisitions of labor should be obeyed. The measures which they took to this end are just as illegal, just as criminal as the measures taken for the requisition itself. The National-Socialist authorities in occupied France proceeded by legislative means. They promulgated ordinances by which sentence of death could be pronounced against persons disobeying requisition orders. I submit two of these ordinances to the Tribunal as evidence. The first was given in the early months of the occupation, October 10, 1940. It was published in the Verordnungsblatt on the 17th of October 1940, page 108. I submit it to the Tribunal under the No. 24, and I read it:
"Ordinance relative to protection against acts of sabotage by virtue of the Four Powers which have been conferred upon me by the Fuehrer and Oberster Befehlshaber der Wehrmacht, I decree the following:
"I. Whoever intentionally does not fulfill or fulfills adequately the tasks of supervision which are conferred to him by the Chief of the Military Administration in France or by a service undertaken by the latter shall be condemned to death."
I skip paragraph 2, and I'll read paragraph 3.
"In less serious cases concerning infractions provided in paragraphs I and 2 of the present ordinance and in case of neglect, the guilty may be punished by reclusion or imprisonment." refer is dated January 31, 1942; it was published in the Verordnungsblatt of the Militarbefehlsabers in Frankreict of 3 February 1942, page 338. I will read it to the Tribunal. I submit it under the No. 25. That reads as follows:
"Ordinance of 31 January 1942 concerning the requisitions of service and requisitions in goods.
"By virtue of the plenary powers which have been conferred, one by the Fuehrer and Oberster Befehlshaber der Wehrmacht, I order the following:
"I. First, anyone who does not carry out these services or the requisitions in goods which are imposed upon them by the Militarbefehlshaber in Frankreich or an authority designated by him or who accomplishes them in such a manner as to make the object of the services or requisitions fail shall be punishable by forced labor, imprisonment, or fine, A penalty of amendment may be uttered in addition to a penalty to forced labor or imprisonment.
"2. In serious cases the penalty of death may be inflicted." These orders were protested by the French authorities. General Doyen protested on several occasions against the first of these without his protest having any effect. I refer again to his letter of the 25th of May 1941, which I have just submitted to the Tribunal, and I read on page 4 of the French translation. This is paragraph 3.
"I am charged with protesting formerly to you against such practices and to beg you to intervene so that an immediate end may be put to this. From the 16th of November, in letter No. 7,843/AE, I already protested against the ordinance that was decreed on the 10th of October 1940 by the Chief of the Military Administration in France, which provided the death penalty against any person failing to carry out or carrying out inadequately the tasks of surveillance imparted by the occupation authorities. I protested then that this requirement, as well as its punishment, were contrary to the spirit of the Armistice Convention, whose object was to relieve the French population from any participation in the hostilities. I had limited myself to this protest in principle because at the time no concrete case in which such task of surveillance might have been imposed had been called to my attention, but it was not possible to accept as justifying the ordinance in question.
"In arguments which you furnished me in your letter No. 1361 of 6 March, you pointed out there, at Article 43 of the Hague Convention, that the occupying power had the authority to legislate, but the power to which you refer in this very article is subject to two qualifications: There can be legislation only to establish and to assure as far as possible public order and the necessities of public life. On the other hand, the ordinances decreed must--"
THE PRESIDENT: You have given sufficient evidence to show that General Doyen protested to the gentl eman. Read all the argument which was put forward on the one side or the other.
MR. HERZOG: I shall then stop this quotation, Mr. President. contained formal violations of the general principles of the criminal legislation of civilized nations; they were made in contradiction of Article 52 at the fourth convention of the Hague, and in contradiction, also, were Article 43, on which they were supposed to be based. They were, therefore, illegal and they were criminal since they provided death sentences which no international law justifies. criminal character of the methods pursued by the defendants in the execution of their recruiting plan of foreign labor. procedure to give an appearance of legality to the recruiting of foreign workers. They called upon workers who were so-called volunteers. From 1940 on, the occupation authorities opened recruiting offices in all the large cities of the occupied territories.
These offices were placed under the control of a special service instituted to this effect within the general staff of the Commanders-in-Chief of the occupation zones. under the control of the General. From 1942 on, and, more precisely, from the day when the defendant Sauckel became the plenipotentiary of labor, they received their orders directly from the latter. General vonFalkenhausen, Commander-in-Chief in Belgium and in the north of France, declared in the testimony which I just now read to the Tribunal that from the summer of 1942 on he had become the simple intermediary in charge of transmitting the instructions given by Sauckel to Arbeitseinsatz. areas was carried out on the sole responsibility of the defendant Sauckel from 1942, under the responsibility of defendant Sauckel, being his direct chief, the delegate to the Four-Year Plan, the defendant Goering. I ask the Tribunal to make note of this. workers for the factories and workshops set up in Europe by the Todt organization and by the Wehrmacht, Kriegsmarine, Luftwaffe, and other German organizations. It was also their task to obtain for the German munition factories the amount of foreign labor needed. Workers recruited in this way signed a labor contract. Thus they had, theoretically, the status of free workers and ware apparently volunteers. The occupation authorities always made a point of the voluntary nature of the recruiting carried out by the employment offices. But the lines taken by their propaganda systematically took no account of what they were actually doing. In fact, the voluntary character of this recruiting was entirely fictitious. The workers of the areas who agreed to sign German labor contracts were subject to physical and moral pressure.
This pressure took several forms: it was sometimes collective and sometimes individual; in all its forms it was heavy enough to deprive the workers who suffered under it of their freedom of choice. The nullity of contracts entered into under the reign of violence is a fundamental principle of the common law of civilized nations.
It is found just as expressly stated in German law as in the laws of the powers represented in the Court or the states occupied by Germany. The German employment offices forced on the foreign workers labor contracts which had no legal significance because they were tainted with violence. I make this as a definite statement and I will provide the Court with proof of my assertions. Germans. The pressure under which the foreign workers suffered was not the result of sporadic action on the part of subordinate authorities. It came from the deliberate intent which the National Socialist leaders of Germany formulated into precise instructions, 26. This is a directive dated January 29, 1942, dealing with the recruiting of foreign workers. This directive comes from the Arbeitseinsatz of the commissariat for the four-year plan. It bears the signature of the Section Chief, Dr. Mansfeld, but it places the executive responsibility directly on the defendant Goering, delegate to the four-year plan. I read this circular:
"Berlin, 29 January 1942. Subject: Increased mobilization of manpower for the German Reich from the occupied territories and preparations for mobilization by force.
"The labor shortage which was rendered more acute by the draft for the Wehrmacht and, on the other hand, the increased scope of the armament problem in the German Reich, render it necessary that manpower for service in the Reich be recruited from the occupied territories to a much greater extent than heretofore in order to relieve the shortage of labor. Therefore, any and all methods must be adopted which make possible the transportation without exception and delay for employment in the Reich of manpower in the occupied territories which is unemployed or which can be released for use in Germany after most careful screening."
I read further on Page 2 of the German text:
"This mobilization as heretofore shall be carried out on a voluntary basis. For this reason the recruiting effort for employment in the German Reich must be strengthened considerably, but if satisfactory results are to be obtained the German authorities who are functioning in the occupied territories must be able to exert any pressure necessary to support the voluntary recruiting of labor for employment inGermany. Accordingly, to the extent that that may be necessary the regulations in force in the occupied territories in regard to shifting employment or withdrawal of support upon refusal to work must be tightened.
"Supplementary regulations concerning shift and distribution in employment must above all insure that older personnel who are freed be exchanged for younger personnel to make up for it so that the latter may be made available for the Reich. A far-reaching decrease in the amount of relief granted by public welfare must also be effective in order to induce laborers to accept employment in the Reich. Unemployment relief must be set so low that the amount in comparison with the average wages in the Reich and the possibilities there for sending remittances home may serve as an inducement to the workers to accept employment in Germany.
"When refusal to accept work in the Reich is not justified the compensation must be reduced to an amount barely enough for subsistence or even be cancelled. In this case partial withdrawal of ration cards and an assignment to particularly heavy, obligatory labor may be considered."
I call to the Tribunal's attention that this circular is addressed to all the services responsible for labor in the occupied areas. Its distribution in Western Europe was: the Reich Commissar for the occupied Norwegian Territories, the Reich Commissar for the occupied Dutch territories, the Chief of the Military Administration of Belgium and Northern France, the Chief of Military Administration of France, the Chief of the Civilian Administration of Luxemburg, the Chief of the Civilian Administration at Metz, and the Chief of the Civilian Administration at Strasbourg.
compelling the workers of the occupied territories to work for Germany. I have now to show how this plan was put into practice in the different occupation zones. The machinery of pressure which the National Socialist authorities exerted on the foreign workers can be analyzed in the following manner. recruitment of foreign workers. This propaganda was intended to deceive the workers of the occupied areas with regard to the material advantages offered them by the German employment courts.
It was carried out by the press, the radio, and by every possible means of publicity. It was also carried on as a side-line to official administrative duties by secret organizations which had been given the task of debauching foreign workers and bringing about through this a ventable impressment.
These measures proved themselves to be insufficient. The occupation authorities then intervened in the social life of the occupied countries. They strove to produce artificial unemployment there. At the same time they devoted their energies to making living conditions worse for the unemployed. the foreign workers showed themselves insensible to German propaganda. This is why the German authorities finally resorted to direct methods of pressure. They exercised pressure on the political authorities of the occupied countries to make them give support to the recruiting campaign. They compelled employers, especially in France and the organizational committees, to encourage their workers to accept the labor contracts of the German employment offices. Finally, they took action by way of direct pressure on the workers, and gradually passed from so-called voluntary recruitment to compulsory enrollment. The fiction of voluntary enrollment was dispelled by the sight of individual arrests and collective raids of which the workers of the occupied areas rapidly became the victims. which I relate. I shall submit the most important of these to the Tribunal. The documents which bring the proof of the publicity campaigns made in France by the German administration will be submitted to the Tribunal by Mr. Edgar Faure in the course of his argument on the Germanization and Nazification.
By way of example I wish to draw upon a document which in the printed classiDelegate of the Minister of the Interior, with the General Administrator of the French Government in the occupied territories. This report points out that a publicity car is circulating through the French territory to incite French workers to go to Germany.
I quote the report:
"Lille, March 25, 1942. Prefect of the Region of the North to M. Prefect, Delegate of the Minister of the Interior with the General Delegation of the French Government in the occupied territories. Subject: German publicity car.
"I have the honor of advising you that for some days a publicity car covered with signs of propaganda inviting French workers to sign up to go and work in Germany has been circulating in the vicinity of Lille, while a loud speaker plays a whole repertoire of discs of French music, among which are featured the "Marche Lorraine", and the hymn "Marechal, Here We Are."
(Whereupon at 1245 hours the hearing of the Tribunal adjourned to reconvene at 1400 hours.)
Military Tribunal, in the matter of: The
M. HERZOG: Mr. President, your Honors. I wished this morning to show what had been the official propaganda given out by the German offices in France to volunteers to work in Germany. The result of this official propaganda was reinforced by the bureaus of clandestine recruitment. The true offices of recruiting were authorized, by the Tribunal -- these employment Bureaus were directed by German agents who seated often in insuring local publicity. In fact, in france, these Bureaus extended their ramifications in the non-occupied zone to the occupied zone. Several documents attest their existence. The fifth among them is a report transmitted the 7th of March, 1942, by the Vice-President, the Council of Ministers, the de facto Government of Vichy, to the General Delegate for Franco-German Economic Relations. It is document 654. This report is drawn under the seal; it bears the signature of the General Staff, Captain De Fontaine. I file this report under the new No. 28 and I read it:
"Vichy, the 7th of March, 1942. Your Honor, The General Delegate; I have the honor of transmitting to you in this letter for your information a report on the organization of recruitment in France of workers for the German industry."
I now go to page 2. "26 of February, 1942. Note: Another item on the organization of recruiting in France, workers for German industry: Source, excellent. First: organization of recruiting in France for workers for Germany was the Mechanical Society of the Seine dont le Siege Paris, at 8th Quai Nationale, which was also known as ANS. This society was to function under the secret control of the commander, and three engineers. One would have the capacity of chief engineer; the other two would be M. Meyer and M. Schronner. Outside of their work, which they are required to carry out, this society is particularly entrusted for the reeducation of workers recruited in France and sent to Germany at the request of German industrial houses; and in full payment of, the society of AMS is assisting for these operations in the occupied zone by three centers of recruiting which functions are in Paris and are the center of Porte De Vincennes, the center of Courbevoie, 200 Boulevard St. Denis.
The center of Avenue des Tourelles. for recuritment of a non-occupied zone. For this zone, the two principal centers are in Marseilles and Toulouse. A third center existing at Tarbes.
"A. The center of Marseille is entrusted with the recruitment in the Meditteranean zone, under the direction of M. Meyer, which is treated below: They ignore the address of this engineer, but one can see many or have information about him in No. 24 Avenue Kleber, Paris, or Militarbefehlshaber at Marseille. The office of the AMS is situated at 85 Rue de Silvabelle. In his task M. Meyer is assisted by M. Ringo, residing in Madrague-Ville, 5 bis Boulevard Bernabo, near the slaughter house." exchanged between the month of December 1941 and January 1942, between the Prefect of the Alpes Maritimes and the authorities of the Vichy Government. This is Document 528 which I file with the Tribunal as No. 29. This correspondence emphasizes the activity of the agents for the clandestine recruiting of the Germans, and particularly M. Meyer, to whom the report of Captain Fontaine applies:
I quote first the letter of the 10th of December. It is the letter which is the fifth page of the French text and the 7th page of the German text, "10th of December, 1941. Nice: The State Counseller, Prefect of the Alpes Maritines to his Honor, the Minister Secretary of State for the Interior, General Secretariate for the Police; under the direction of the Foreign police in the Occupied territory and of Foreigners."
"Object: The activity of foreign agents, attending to the discharging of specialized workers. Reference: The program 12,1402, and 12,1426; the 28th of November, 1941. My report: 955 and. 986 of the 24th of November, 1941, and the 6th of December, 1941, by which my report referred to. I pointed out to you the activity of recru iting agents who sought to have discharged specialized workers forthe benefit of Germany.
I have the honor to address you below, to give you a few complimentary indications gathered in this respect; The German engineer, M. Meyer, and the French subject, M. Bentz. Benefits stopped on the 1st of December 1921 at the Hotel Splendid, at Nice, coming from Marseilles."
Now, I go to the third paragraph before the end. I permit myself to particularly draw the attention of the Tribunal to the fact that in Paris the hiring of workers was carried out for Germany. I start here the quotation:
"These documents attest the activity of the clandestine recruiting offices and the way in which they developed. I am not merely satisfied to point out their existence. I wish to show that these Gaus functioned under the initiative of the official administration and of the German Office for Labor." The proof is furnished by a statement which the accused. Sauckel made the first of March, 1944, during the 54th conference of the central of the office for the Four-Year-Plan. The stenographic transcript of these conferences have been found. If forms document R-124, to which my American colleagues have already referred. I submit it again to the Tribunal under No. 30 and I shall read from an extract of the transcript of the session on the 1st of March 1944. Document No. 30, in the French text, page 2, second paragraph; in the German text, 1760, 70 and 71. I read:
"The most abominal thing accomplished by my adversaries, and speaking of Sauckel, it is that they pretend that no executive measure has been foreseen in these sectors to recruit in a rational manner the French, the Belgians, and Italians to send them to work. Thereupon, I wish to employ and train a whole group of French male and female agents who, for adequate remuneration, just as it was done in older times through shangaiing, while hunting for men and intoxicating them with alcohol."
THE PRESIDENT: I am told that this has been read before by the United Sates.
M. HERZOG: I will not go on. Now, I pass to the propaganda of the official offices and that of the clandestine recruiting offices which I will reveal to be inefficacious. The National Socialist authorities then had resort to methods of economic pressure. They tried to give to the workers who were not for Germany the hope of material advantages. I submit in this relation in respect to this, an ordnance of the General Military Command in Belgium and in the North of France, which I submit to the Tribunal. It is an ordnance of July 20, 1942, which appeared in the Verordnungsblatt of Belgium -- it exempts from tax Belgian workers who work in German factories. I submit to the Tribunal under the No.21. On the other hand, the occupation authorities sort to diminish the living standard of workers who remained in the occupied territories. I said that they had made poverty a factor in their recruiting policy. I am going to prove it by showing how they went about creating artificial employment in the occupation zones and to deteriorating the m aterial situation of the unemployed. policy of freezing salaries. This measure favored the recruiting campaign for labor who were to leave for Germany, and had also an economic bearing, and I would like to refer the Tribunal to the explanations which will be given to it on this point by M. Gerthoffer.
Unemployment spread about by two complimentary measures. The first is the regulation of the legal length of work. The second: concentrations, if need be, the closing of industrial enterprises. the duration of work in their administrative zones. In France, initiative taken by the local authorities brought about a strong reaction. The problem was generalized and solved on a national plan. Long negotiations were imposed on the representatives of the pseudo-Government of Vichy and finally an ordnance of April 22, 1942, from the military command in France, reserved for the occupation authorities the right of fixing the duration of work of industrial enterprises.
This ordnance appeared in their Vererdnungsblatt Frankreich, 1942. I submit it to the Tribunal under the No.32 and I quote the first paragraph: First part:
"For establishment and enterprises of all kinds a minimum of working hours may be imposed.
This minimum of the length of work will be or for individual enterprises."
the 6th of October, 1942, which appeared in the Verordnungsblatt of Belgium. I submit this ordnance to the Tribunal under No. 33. The regulation of the duration of work. That is why the National Socialist authorities used a second method. Under the pretext of rationalizing production, they brought about a concentration of industrial commercial enterprises which certainly were closed on their initiative. I cite in this relation the provisions which were taken or imposed by the Germans in France, in Belgium andin Holland. In France, I would like to refer to two texts; the first is the Law of the Vichy Government of 17 December 1941, which I submit to the Tribunal under the No. 34. is the ordnance of February 25, 1942, issued by the Military Command in France. This ordnance appeared in the Verordnungsblatt in Frankreich.
I guess I shall read from it to the Tribunal; this ordnance seems particularly important because the principle of the compulsory closing of certain French enterprises definitely established by a legislative text by the occupying power. I shall read the first and second paragraph. The first paragraph:
"If the economic situation, notably the use of raw materials and indirect materials for the manufacture, require from the establishments and economic enterprises, surprised that these establishments may be closed completely or partly."
Second paragraph:
"The closing of these enterprises were pronounced by the General Feldkommandantur by means of a written notification addressed to the establishment or to the industrial enterprise."