NAZI WAR LOOT

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26596, 20 October 1947, Page 5

NAZI WAR LOOT

RESTORATION OF GOLD TRIPARTITE COMMISSION’S DISTRIBUTION Rec. 8 p.m. BRUSSELS, Oct. 17. The Tripartite Commission on the restoration of gold looted by the Nazis announced in Brussels that as a preliminary distribution it would restore to Belgium 90,649 kilogrammes of gold (about 89 tons), to the Netherlands 35,890 kilogrammes (35.42 tons), and to Luxemburg 19.29 kilogrammes (1.89 tons). The commission set aside 33,783 kilogrammes (33.17 tons) for Austria and 3805 kilogrammes (3.73 tons) for Italy after it had decided that the proportions of those two countries’ claims were valid. The bulk of the distribution consists of gold looted by the Nazis, and recovered by the United States Army in the salt mines at Merkers, Germany in 1945. The balance is from looted gold the Nazis sold to Switzerland and which that country turned over’ to the Allies in 1946. Belgium will deliver its present allocation to France under the agreement of 1944, under which France returned to Belgium gold of the Belgian National Bank which, having been transferred to Paris on the eve of the invasion of Belgium, was later captured by the Germans. Luxemburg under a similar agreement, wilt also hand its present share to France. Albania, Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Italy, Luxemburg, the Netherlands, Poland, and Yugoslavia have filed claims, but legal problems have arisen in some cases which require further adjudication. The commission has kept in reserve sufficient to satisfy any claims which it may deem valid. Negotiations are in progress for the admission of Poland to participation in the pool. The commission is also negotiating with neutral countries for the recovery of stolen gold. Sweden agreed to restore all gold received from Germany which Sweden regards as having been looted. For that reason it is probable that the commission will make some further payment on claims already accepted. The French representative on the commission, on which Britain and the United States are also represented, said the value of the gold the Bank of France would receive from Belgium and Luxemburg was £26,000,000.