30 March 2007
The Jewish Claims Conference (JCC) and German retail group KarstadtQuelle have reached a settlement in their dispute over a property in central Berlin. KarstadtQuelle agreed to pay EUR 88 million (US$ 117 million) to the heirs of the so-called Lenné-Triangle property which formerly belonged to the Jewish Wertheim family and was seized by the Nazis. According to the Jewish Claims Conference, KarstadtQuelle's payment is one of the highest ever paid as compensation for confiscations carried out by the Nazi regime.
"The material aspect of the settlement is not the most important," as the agreement has "tremendous symbolic character," JCC executive vice-president Gideon Taylor said. "It is a very important step, to correct the injustice of the past." Taylor said that his meeting with KarstadtQuelle CEO Thomas Middelhoff several weeks ago had been a highly symbolic moment. Until then, KarstadtQuelle had consistently rejected the Jewish Claims Conference's claim for compensation. The company has now said it had already made provisions to be able to indemnify the Wertheim family. The Lenné-Triangle is located at Potsdam Square, just meters from the Germany's new Holocaust memorial and on the line where the Berlin Wall once stood.
