No Trial for Poles Who Killed Jews in 1941

A war crimes investigator said yesterday that he was closing his inquiry into a wartime massacre of Jews in south-eastern Poland, but would not be bringing charges, despite a finding that local people had played the "decisive role".

The truth of what happened in Jedwabne on July 10 1941 is at the centre of debate about the wartime role played by Poles, who, until last year, had seen themselves almost solely as victims of the Third Reich. The massacre, along with others perpetrated during the Nazi occupation, had for decades been ascribed to German troops.

But last year, an emigre Polish historian, Jan Gross, blamed the deaths of up to 1,600 Jews on Polish neighbours. During the 60th anniversary of the killings, President Aleksander Kwasniewski apologised for his nation.

After the year-long inquiry, special prosecutor Radoslaw Ignatiew called Mr Gross's estimate of victims was "improbably high". Exhumations found the remains of between 40 and 50 victims in one mass grave, while the number of bodies in a second could not be verified. He said more work was needed for a final estimate.

The inquiry established that German forces were at the scene and had incited the killings. But it uncovered no incontrovertible evidence of an active German role.

"We can say that the crime in Jedwabne was committed with German inspiration," he said, adding: "We have to conclude that the role of the local population was decisive in the perpetration of this criminal act."

Although up to 100 surviving witnesses were interviewed, Mr Ignatiew said their accounts were contradictory and did not provide enough evidence to launch new prosecutions. After a hasty trial by a communist court in 1949, 12 people were convicted of assisting Germans in the murder.

"We plan to drop the investigation as no perpetrators were found other than those already convicted," Mr Ignatiew said.

Despite accounts that the Germans forced Poles to commit the crime at gunpoint, the investigation concluded that a band of 40 men, armed with sticks, rounded up Jews on the town square, marched them to a barn and burned it down.

The German role at that point was unclear, although it was probably small or non-existent, said Mr Ignatiew, adding that the Germans did not have large units in the town.

The Jedwabne massacre took place after German troops replaced the earlier, Soviet occupiers. Some historians suggested that the Poles acted out of revenge for what they saw as Jewish cooperation with the Soviet invaders.