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This clip shows German President Rau in 1999 officially apologising to slave and forced labourers used by German industry during the Second World War. The footage also shows two lawyers who negotiated a settlement with the German Government on behalf of surviving labourers commenting on the apology. German lawyer Dr Michael Vitti acknowledges that closure will never be possible for the victims and US lawyer Ed Fagan says that other countries he believes profited from the Holocaust will now be targeted. The clip includes a narration.

Educational value points

• About 12 million people worked as slave and forced labourers in Germany and its occupied territories during the Second World War (1939–45), and this clip shows German President Johannes Rau in 1999 making an official apology to these victims. Forced labourers came from countries occupied by Germany, such as Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Russia, while most slave labourers were Jews interned in concentration camps.

• President Rau’s apology was part of a settlement negotiated between the German Government and the governments of the USA, Israel and several eastern European states, as well as lawyers and groups representing surviving labourers. In 2000, the German Government and industry set up a 10 billion deutschmark (about $8.4 billion) fund to compensate surviving slave and forced labourers, who received lump sum payments of up to 15,000 deutschmark (about $12,600).

• President Rau refers to the injustice done to slave and forced labourers, who worked 12 to 18 hours a day, seven days a week and were given meagre daily rations, often consisting of a bowl of thin soup and a piece of bread. Slave labourers were worked to death under a policy known as 'extermination through labour’, and according to the US Holocaust Memorial Museum, in some camps up to two-thirds of the workers died from malnutrition, beatings, dysentery and overwork.

• The treatment of slave labourers was part of the 'final solution’ of Germany’s Chancellor, Adolf Hitler, which involved the systematic extermination of people whom the Nazis considered to be subhuman and racially impure, including Jews, homosexuals, gypsies and the disabled. About 6 million Jews and 5 million non-Jews were murdered by the Nazis in work, medical experimentation and concentration camps during the Second World War.

• Slave and forced labourers worked in agriculture, construction and industry, particularly in munitions factories, and were integral to the German war economy, freeing up men to fight on the Front, but also providing the machinery of war. Otto Lambsdorff, who represented Germany in negotiations to secure reparations for these workers, acknowledged that 'there was hardly a German company that did not use slave and forced labor during World War II’ (http://www.nyed.uscourts.gov).

• The German Government’s decision to make reparations to the estimated 1.25 million surviving slave and forced labourers, through compensation and an official apology, is a form of restorative justice. However, like German lawyer Dr Michael Vitti, some people believe that 'closure’ will never be possible for the survivors. Former slave labourer Aron Krell concurs, saying that 'money can never compensate me for my lost family and childhood’ (http://www.genocidewatch.org).

• US lawyer Ed Fagan indicates in this clip that the settlement with the German Government and industry opens the way for litigation against other countries that he claims profited from the Holocaust, including the USA, Britain and France. For example, evidence has emerged that US companies such as Ford, General Motors, General Electric and IBM had investments in German companies that used slave and forced labour.

• Paying for the Past is an 'expository’ documentary, a style that relies on the spoken word to advance an argument or particular perspective, and that uses images to support this. While Ed Fagan asserts that 'victims’ justice is going to prevail’, the clip leaves open the issue of whether adequate reparations can be made to slave and enforced labourers by cutting from footage of Rau making an official apology to Dr Vitti’s comment that closure is impossible for the survivors.

Presidential Palace, Berlin
Narrator As part of the negotiated settlement, Germany’s President Rau makes the crucial apology to forced and slave labourers and all others who suffered.
President Rau (translated) Money is not the most important factor for many of them. They want the injustice that was done to them to be seen for what it was and I ask in the name of the German people for forgiveness.
Dr Michael Vitti, German lawyer Everybody thinks it’s closure. My opinion is when you see the survivors, see how touched they are by the words of the President, they will never forget. There will never be a closure. Material, maybe, but closure, forget it. Not with these people, not with what happened to them.

Lawyers involved in the case walk outside the palace after the apology.
Man 1 Stand back there. I want to take your picture.
Man 2 You’re taking pictures?
Man 1 Yeah, absolutely.
Ed Fagan, US lawyer The Japanese are next and there are other countries in Eastern Europe that are next and the West – France, England, United States. There’s a whole lot of places that profited off of the Holocaust. All of those places, all of those countries, all of those governments, should now listen and they should have heard this shot very clearly. We just sent the message to the rest of the world that Switzland was first, Austria, partially, was second, Germany is the clarion bell and if they think that they’re going to get away with it, they’ve got another thing coming because victims’ justice is going to prevail.