Sobibor survivor: Demjanjuk trial will go down in history
Thomas Blatt was one of the few to survive the Sobibor extermination camp in Nazi-occupied Poland during World War II. The 82-year-old is now a key witness in the Munich trial of John Demjanjuk, who is alleged to have been a guard at Sobibor.
Deutsche Welle: Why did you decide to come to Germany for this trial?
Thomas Blatt: Because when I escaped from Sobibor, I promised myself that if I survived, I will do everything to tell the story of Sobibor. And that's what I'm doing. And I know that Demjanjuk knows a lot, because Demjanjuk was in the middle of the Holocaust. And he denies that it is him, that he was not a guard at Sobibor, but he was. I don't care if Demjanjuk is in jail or not. I do care that he should tell the truth. And the truth is, that he was a guard at Sobibor.
Sobibor was not a simple concentration camp. Sobibor was an extermination camp. At Sobibor the guards were simple murderers. In a concentration camp a guard was a guard, … responsible [for preventing] people from running away. But at Sobibor they were simple murderers...
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Deutsche Welle: Why did you decide to come to Germany for this trial?
Thomas Blatt: Because when I escaped from Sobibor, I promised myself that if I survived, I will do everything to tell the story of Sobibor. And that's what I'm doing. And I know that Demjanjuk knows a lot, because Demjanjuk was in the middle of the Holocaust. And he denies that it is him, that he was not a guard at Sobibor, but he was. I don't care if Demjanjuk is in jail or not. I do care that he should tell the truth. And the truth is, that he was a guard at Sobibor.
Sobibor was not a simple concentration camp. Sobibor was an extermination camp. At Sobibor the guards were simple murderers. In a concentration camp a guard was a guard, … responsible [for preventing] people from running away. But at Sobibor they were simple murderers...