Mannheim public proscutor Hans-Heiko "Freisler" Klein justifies his attack on Free Speech under Germany's new laws.

Melbourne, Friday, November 12, 1999

A War of Words in the Battle for History

By Chris Hastings

By GEOFF KITNEY

MANNHEIM, GERMANY -- Hans Klein knows well the sort of people he is dealing with, so he was not surprised that more than seven months in a German jail had not caused the defendant a moment's self-doubt.

"They never reflect that they have done something wrong or weaken in their opinions," said Mr Klein, the successful prosecutor of a dozen people under German laws aimed at preserving the memory of the Holocaust and suppressing anti-Semitism and racial hatred.

"But that is no reason to stop taking them to court. It is extremely important that we act against these people whenever they challenge the law. We owe it to the memory of the people who died and we need to do it to protect our own future."

Until he opens his mouth Fredrick Toben could be a friendly old uncle, a short, roundish man with a big, open face who looks older than his 55 years. But when he speaks he proves Mr Klein's point.

"They tried to break me in there," said Dr Toben, pointing to the high, razor-wire capped stone walls of the Mannheim district prison, in the industrial suburbs of this bleak southern German city. "They still have verballing here. It's not like Australia, the police can take you into a room where nothing that happens is recorded and put pressure on you. But that which doesn't kill me makes me stronger.

"This is a wonderful day. This is a victory for free speech. We have saved the Internet as a place where we can tell the truth and not be punished for it."

He was speaking less than 24 hours after the Mannheim local court had convicted him on five counts of breaching German laws against incitement of racial hatred, insulting the memory of the dead and denying the truth of the Holocaust. Dr Toben had been sentenced to 10 months' imprisonment but, because he had already served seven months on remand, was allowed to be released on payment of $5000 bail. The money was raised in hours by German sympathisers.

Dr Toben had got off lightly. The shortest previous sentence for such crimes in Germany had been two years' jail, and the prosecution had sought two years and four months for him. But the court decided the most serious evidence against Dr Toben could not be taken into account because it related to material published on the Internet. The judges concluded German law had no jurisdiction in relation to this material.

Mr Klein, who prosecuted the case, immediately lodged an appeal, warning the decision set a dangerous precedent.

"This is the first time a court in Germany has decided that some things which are said in Germany on the Internet cannot be subject to German laws. This is a very bad thing. It will undermine our laws which are very important for ensuring that history in Germany is not repeated."

As he spoke metres from where he had spent seven months paying for his attempts to force Holocaust revisionism into the German public debate, Dr Toben confirmed Mr Klein's fears.

"I will not be silenced. I intend to keep using the Internet to promote discussion on these issues. I believe in seeking the truth. Why are they so afraid in Germany of allowing open discussion about the so-called Holocaust? It can only be because they are afraid of the truth."

The "truth" Dr Toben writes about on the Internet site that he set up in Adelaide under the name of the Adelaide Institute is his conclusion that there was no systematic mass murder of Jews by Hitler's Nazis in concentration camp gas chambers. He said he wanted to explain this belief to the court but was unable to do so because to have restated his views in court would have resulted in him facing further prosecution.

"I wanted the court to go with me to Auschwitz and see the evidence. In any case where murder is alleged there has to be a murder weapon. I have been to Auschwitz and I know there is no mass murder weapon there. The so-called gas chambers do not exist."

In the German legal system no privilege protects the evidence of witnesses in court. If a defendant says something in court which repeats the crime for which he is being tried, he can be charged again. This happened a few months ago to Dr Toben's lawyer, Ludwig Bock, when he was defending a German Holocaust revisionist. Mr Bock criticised former German leaders and judges for denying debate about the Holocaust and Mr Klein immediately charged him [Website: the defence attorney!] with inciting racial hatred.

Mr Bock refused to defend Dr Toben in court, saying to do so would risk another prosecution. Dr Toben refused to conduct his own defence, giving the same reasons.

Hans Klein has no sympathy for them. "If they had repeated things in this court which were against the law I would have charged them again," he said.

Mr Klein's uncompromising pursuit of Holocaust revisionists is based on his fear that a growing international network of far-right extremists is involved in a well-planned campaign to undermine Germany's 50-year-old legal code, established to ensure that the historical story of the Holocaust was preserved in the hope that it would never be repeated.

And he is worried that the Internet is becoming an increasingly effective weapon in this campaign.

"This is an issue for all democratic governments," he said. "If national laws are made ineffective by the Internet this is a very serious issue for the rule of law."

Mr Klein believes German Holocaust revisionists want to cleanse the historical record of the truth of the mass murder of millions of Jews by the Nazis to make the historical record for Adolf Hitler's National Socialism more respectable.

He says there are a lot of Germans who still believed Hitler was a leader with good policies. They would like to advocate a return to these policies. But it was not respectable to say so because of the inconvenient truth of the mass murder of Jews.

If they could only succeed in creating enough doubts about the truth of the Holocaust to make people think that maybe it didn't happen, then they could make his place in history more respectable, Mr Klein says.