On the first day of his trial in Germany for alleged crimes committed at Auschwitz in 1944, 93-year-old former SS officer Oskar Gröning asked the victims for “forgiveness” over his role at the Nazi death camp.
"For me, there is no question that I share moral guilt," he told the court. Gröning is accused of being an accessory to murder in 300,000 cases, referring to the number of Hungarian Jews killed at Auschwitz during the period in question. He worked at Auschwitz in German-occupied Poland at the age of 21.
He admitted that he knew about the gassing of Jews and other prisoners. “I ask for forgiveness,” he said at the trial, which was attended by almost 70 Holocaust survivors and victims’ relatives, while insisting he had never physically harmed a prisoner himself.
“It is up to you to decide on my legal culpability,” Gröning told the court in the northern German town of Lüneburg.
On the second day of the trial, the defendant told the court that he had been assigned to work at the "ramp" three times between May and July 1944. This referred to the selection process that determined if new prisoners arriving at Auschwitz were fit to work or if they were to be sent to their deaths in the camp's gas chambers.
Gröning said he did not regularly take part in ramp duty. His responsibilities at the camp had included collecting money, luggage and other valuables from arriving prisoners, sorting it, and sending it on to the Nazi SS. The prosecution argues that this created a benefit for the Nazi regime and supported the systematic killing of Jews and other minorities during World War II.
Dozens of Auschwitz survivors are co-plaintiffs in the case, which could be one of the last of its kind due to the fact that most former Auschwitz soldiers have already died.
Prior to the trial, Gröning had been open about the fact that he worked at Auschwitz during the war. Although he admitted that he was ashamed of his role, saying he was "a cog in the killing machine," he maintains that he never personally committed any atrocities.
The charges brought against him do not accuse him of direct involvement in the killing.
