Charges may be brought against Poles for 1941 Jedwabne mass murder

Prosecutors may charge Poles with the 1941 Jedwabne mass killing of some 1,600 Jews, whose murderers were thought for decades to have been members of the infamous Nazi Gestapo police, said Leon Kieres, head of the National Remembrance Institute, which is conducting an investigation into the tragic event. The probe, initiated last year after Polish emigre Jan Gross's controversial book "Neighbors" cited testimonies of Jewish survivors blaming Poles, seeks to determine who in fact was responsible for the atrocity that took place in the small northwestern town on July 10, 1941. "There is a possibility of presenting new charges, if they specify direct responsibility [for the killings] and not just assisting," Kieres told a news conference. He did not elaborate on who might be charged with the crime. A 1949 investigation into the massacre resulted in guilty sentences for some Poles for assisting Germans in the murder. Last month, local Jedwabne authorities dismantled a monument with an inscription blaming Nazi Germans for the crime and plans have been made to commemorate the victims properly. President Aleksander Kwasniewski intends to make a symbolic apology for the massacre on its 60th anniversary on July 10. (Reuters)