Wiesenthal Center offers EUR 10,000 for finding old nazi collaborators

The Szymon Wiesenthal Center, which has been pursuing nazi's, their collaborators and World War II criminals, is about to launch a new initiative. The Center is going to activate a free telephone line where people who know about those who killed or denounced the Jews to the nazi's can now give information about them. These reports will be checked and compiled in Jerusalem and then sent back to the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN) in Poland. The reward for a tip-off which leads to a prosecution will be EUR10,000. "Money catches people's attention and we need something to interest them," said Efraim Zuroff, head of the Jerusalem office of the Wiesenthal Center. In Poland, the controversial idea has already aroused many protests, with Bronisław Geremek, shooting down the idea as "disgusting", while Gazeta Wyborcza editor Adam Michnik wrote a front page editorial labeling it as a bad idea. (Gazeta Wyborcza, p. 1) A.F.