THIS episode if none other shows the frailty of Evans's memory and the power of his mendacity. For what was actually said, see the transcript of March 15, 2000 (Day 32 of the Trial) below. The reader will search in vain for any similarity to what Evans says let alone for a reprimand by the Judge or general hilarity. Come to that, he will also search the next day's newspaper in vain for any reference to what Evans (and others) say happened.

[Page 193:]

MR IRVING: Yes, unless otherwise informed. The raw details are, when the when camera's meter shows 170021 I am first seen arriving at an unnamed hotel restaurant in Halle, accompanied by Mrs Worch and by David Leigh of The Sunday Observer. At 17:14:40 I am again glimpsed, 14 minutes later, still at the hotel speaking to a reporter. The cameraman and David Leigh then go off to film the rival processions during which I am at no time seen on film. In fact I remained lunching at the hotel. At 18:11:00 a truck is seen being rigged as an open-air platform, and at 18:14:26 I am seen with two reporters watching from the edge of the square. In my submission, my Lord, I do not have a particularly happy look on my face at all at what I am seeing. At 18:16 I walk over to the platform, hands in pockets and mount it. The man whom Professor Funke tells us is Dienel, and I have no way of checking it one way or

[P-194:]

the other, is seen to get off to the left and there is no contact whatever between him and me. Mr Worch briefly introduces me to the audience. I begin speaking at 18:16:39 and the filmed portion of my speech ends less than three and a half minutes later. When the off-screen chanting of slogans begins at 18:18:59 I am clearly seen to interrupt my speech, shake my head at them and gesticulate with my left hand to them to stop, and I am clearly heard to say, "You must not", because they are shouting the "Siegheil" slogans, "Mein Führer", and things like, "you must not always be thinking of the past". I am heard clearly to say: "You must always be thinking of the past. You must not keep coming out with the slogans of the past. We are thinking of the future [voice emphasised] of Germany. We are thinking of the future of the German people. As an Englishman I have to say ...", and so on. So I am quite clearly expressing extreme anger at these people who have come along with their Nazi slogans. Six seconds after ending my brief speech I am seen to leave the platform without further contact with anybody. My diary notes that I at once left by car and drove back to the Ruhr in Western Germany. Heavily edited, for example to remove my rebuke to these slogan-shouting people, whom I took and take to have been agents provocateurs, this sequence was shown on

[p.195:]

November 28th and 29th to British TV audiences in a "This Week" programme entitled "Hitler's Children, the New Nazis", directed by the German Michael Schmidt, Professor Funke's star witness, and with none other than Gerald Gable of Searchlight listed as the consultant, and in Despatches on the other channel. This indicates whose hands were behind the editing. Again, heavily edited the film has been shown around the world against me. This was the thrice edited film to which I drew your Lordship's attention in suggesting there was evidence of dubious admissibility.

May I again remind your Lordship of my basic principle on lecturing. Unlike the Defendants who have proudly stated that they refuse to debate with opponents, I have expressed a readiness to attend, to address all and any who are willing to listen. Your Lordship will remember my letter of June 24th 1988 to my editor William Morrow, Connie Roosevelt, to whom I wrote: "I have been invited to speak as a guest speaker at a right-wing function in Los Angeles next February. They have offered a substantial fee and all my expenses, and until now I have adopted a policy of never refusing an invitation if the speakers meet my terms, namely a free speech and a fat fee. On this occasion I intend to give the audience a piece of mind about some of their lunatic views."

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I may secondly point out that were it not for the clandestine activities of the violent and extremist bodies dedicated to destroy my right to free speech and the rights of all audiences in the United States and elsewhere, at Berkeley, at Dublin, Pretoria or wherever, to hear my opponents and equally dedicated to intimidating my publishers and smashing bookstall windows, where it not for their hate campaign I would have been able to continue in the normal manner with my exemplary professional career. It rings hollow that the same shabby bodies who have generated the hatred against me now point their crooked finger at my and abuse me using the very considerable privileges afforded to them by this court, to continuing to make my voice heard whenever I can. When I use words to describe them in detail, which they well deserve, they ring their hands lament about extremism. I have pointed out that so far as Germany is concerned, none of the German bodies who invited me to speak was illegal or banned. In fact when first invited to address the German Peoples Union I wrote to and telephoned the Germany Embassy, as the documents in my discovery show, and asked them specifically whether this was a legal and constitutional body. The Embassy confirmed in writing on July 25th 1984 that it was. The extremism was in the eye of beholder. The further to the left the beholder squinted from, the more distant these

[P-197:]

bodies may have seemed from him. We have heard a lot from Professor Funke, the sociologist of the Free University in Berlin. My Lord, I am now going to pass over the next two pages and continue from the bottom of page 94. As for his allegation, the allegation by Professor Funke, here in court, my Lord, I also ask you to disregard those two pages.

MR JUSTICE GRAY: Yes, I think I know why, and I think that is very right and proper.