NEW BERLIN EXHIBITION ADDS TO DRIVE FOR CENTER REMEMBERING EXPELLED GERMANS
Geir Moulson

AP Worldstream
Aug 09, 2006

A new exhibition tracking the fate of Germans expelled from eastern
Europe after World War II, along with that of victims of other 20th
century expulsions, revives an issue that has troubled Germany’s
relations with its neighbors.

The "Forced Paths" exhibition, initiated by the head of a group
representing the expelled Germans and opening Thursday, places the
Germans’ fate alongside eight other episodes from European history.

The exhibition, at the Kronprinzenpalais on Berlin’s Unter den Linden
boulevard, runs through Oct. 29.

Its initiator sees it as a balanced step toward a permanent center
documenting their plight. But neighboring Poland fears that it will
present a one-sided account.

The show is a "signal on the part of the German expellees, who
are making this clear: we had our fate, but we also stand by other
expellees," said organizer Erika Steinbach, the head of Germany’s
Federation of Expellees.

Steinbach has advocated a Berlin-based "Center against Expulsions"
to remember an estimated 12.5 million ethnic Germans who, often
viewed as enemies or traitors, were expelled from or fled Poland,
then-Czechoslovakia and elsewhere when the Third Reich collapsed and
borders were moved westward.

Poland, in particular, has opposed that idea, suggesting that it
would serve to minimize the suffering of countries brutally occupied
by the Nazis. Some 2.5 million Germans left what is now Poland.

Steinbach, a lawmaker with Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian
Democrats, disputes that.

She argued Wednesday that, while Germany should be aware of Polish
sensitivities, it should "make clear that there is a need for us in
Germany too to deal with our history in its entirety _ and the theme
of expulsions belongs to that."

The new exhibition, which will include witness accounts, features the
expulsions alongside events that range from the killing of Armenians
by Ottoman Turks, through the Nazis’ deportation of Poles and others,
to the wars of the 1990s in the former Yugoslavia.

Organizers drew in advisers from seven countries, including the Czech
Republic, Hungary and Israel, to ensure a "European perspective,"
Steinbach said.

However, she said a Polish adviser quit the project because he faced
"too much pressure" at home.

In Poland, deputy culture minister Krzysztof Olendzki voiced fears
that the exhibition would present a "one-sided" vision of the past
and present the expelled Germans as being among the last century’s
greatest victims.

"The reasons behind the expelling are not clearly presented," said
Olendzki, who said he had not seen the show but was familiar with its
content and backers. "The exhibition also passes over responsibility
for the crimes committed by the German state during World War II."

Steinbach said last November’s change of government in Germany,
which brought Merkel to power, "significantly raised" the chances of
a permanent center in Berlin.

The idea was long backed by Merkel’s conservatives but opposed by their
coalition partners, predecessor Gerhard Schroeder’s Social Democrats.

In their coalition accord, they agreed that they "want, in the
spirit of reconciliation, to set a visible example also in Berlin,"
in cooperation with eastern European countries, "to remember the
wrong of expulsions."

However, they left open what that would entail, and set no timetable.

"I hope this (the new exhibition) is an important step toward making
a documentation center reality," Steinbach said.

German Culture Minister Bernd Neumann gave the show a cautious welcome,
pointing to its "European components" and promising that the government
will consider it in drawing up its own plan.

Tensions over the legacy of World War II flared two years ago after
a small group of Germans calling itself the Prussian Claims Society
threatened court action to reclaim ancestral property in present-day
Poland.

It has yet to make good on that threat, which prompted Poland’s
parliament to urge the government to seek reparations from Germany
for losses suffered during the Nazi occupation. The government refused.

Merkel’s government says it stands by Schroeder’s pledge to oppose
restitution claims by Germans.

___

Associated Press writers Michael Fischer in Berlin and Ryan Lucas in
Warsaw, Poland contributed to this report.