840.48 Refugees/9–2044: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Minister in Switzerland (Harrison)
3245. The following for McClelland is WRB 178. You are requested to convey to German authorities through official Swiss channels, with reference to persistent reports of renewed or impending deportations of Jews from Hungary and Slovakia by order of such authorities, this Government’s emphatic protest against these deportations and its unflinching determination to see to the apprehension and punishment of all persons participating in any form whatsoever in these deportations or in any other forms of persecution in Hungary or Slovakia.
The attention of German authorities should also be called in this connection, and referring to final paragraph your 5109 of August 8,11 [Page 1160] to position of this Government regarding deportations from recognized civilian internment camps of holders of documents issued in the name of American Republics. The German authorities will be held strictly accountable unless all such persons are immediately returned to civilian internment camps supervised by Intercross.12
Also, please use all channels available to you to make strongest possible unofficial representations on both points to appropriate individual German officials.
- Not printed; it concerned (1) refusal by the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs at Berlin to furnish Swiss Legation information on group of 163 Jews removed from Vittel to Bergen-Belsen contending they were not nationals of countries under Swiss protection, and (2) supplementary information promised Swiss Legation by two functionaries then absent (840.48 Refugees/8–844).↩
- The Minister reported in telegram 7204, October 30, 1944, 3 p.m., from Bern: “Swiss note October 26 states Swiss Legation Berlin orally communicated to German Foreign Office substance first and second paragraphs Department’s 3245, September 20 (WRB 178).” (840.48 Refugees/10–3044)↩