Nazi documents found in archives of Argentina's Supreme Court

Argentina has discovered hundreds of documents and membership cards from Nazi organisations in boxes stored in the archives of the Supreme Court.

The files relate to a case opened in 1941, according to reporting by the Clarín newspaper.

The discovery came from judicial staff relocating files for the creation of a future Supreme Court museum. The boxes were in the basement of the Palace of Justice in the capital, where paper records from old cases are stored.

Seven boxes of items were opened last Friday (May 9) and the contents have been secured for classification, documentation and preservation by order of the Supreme Court. The aim is to determine whether the materials could provide relevant information concerning events related to the Holocaust or the escape of Nazi officers to Argentina.

The material was identified as propaganda from Adolf Hitler’s regime, intended to spread Nazi ideology in Argentina. According to Clarín, initial inspections also uncovered photographs and hundreds of membership booklets from the so-called “Unión Alemana de Gremios,” featuring swastikas on the cover.

Some documents are in very poor condition, while others have been well preserved, according to images published Clarín.

The formal opening of the boxes took place in the presence of Supreme Court Chief Justice Horacio Rosatti, AMIA’s Chief Rabbi Eliahu Hamra, Buenos Aires Holocaust Museum Director Jonathan Karszenbaum, researcher Marcia Ras and other legal officials and experts.

To date, the Supreme Court has not commented on the matter.

Records indicate the materials entered Argentina on June 20, 1941, aboard the Japanese ship Nan-a-Maru and were sent by the German Embassy in Tokyo. Though the shipment was declared as “personal effects,” Customs officials flagged it and alerted then-foreign minister Enrique Ruiz Guiñazú.

According to local media reports, the Comisión Especial Investigadora de las Actividades Anti-Argentina del Congreso (“Special Congressional Commission for the Investigation of Anti-Argentine Activities”) – which was later dissolved – requested judicial intervention to examine whether the boxes contained material that could jeopardise the nation’s policy of neutrality during World War II. 

The commission reviewed part of the contents. In August 1941, investigators found membership booklets, as well as postcards and photos containing Nazi propaganda. The German Embassy attempted to reclaim the shipment, but a federal judge ordered its seizure.

The files were transferred to the Supreme Court in September 1941, given that the case involved a foreign state. The boxes remained in judicial custody for more than 80 years until their discovery.

Rosatti has ordered the preservation of the materials and the creation of an inventory to assess whether the documents contain new information on the Holocaust or Nazi financing networks. 

After the war, a number of Nazi criminals such as Josef Mengele and Adolf Eichmann fled to Argentina, along with hundreds of German collaborators.

On April 1, earlier this year, Argentina declassified files to assist the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Holocaust investigations. It is estimated that thousands of Nazis passed through or took refuge in Argentina after the war.

– TIMES/AFP/NA