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Discussion about the future begins

05-23-2008 12:49 PM CET | Politics, Law & Society

Press release from: Internationaler Suchdienst (ITS)

The International Commission for the International Tracing Service (ITS) opened the discussion on the future of the institution today. In the course of the two-day Commission’s Annual Meeting at Warsaw, it was decided that a working group to deal with this subject would be set up. “Following the opening of the archives for research and the reduction of the amount of humanitarian work, details of the future structure of and administrative responsibility for the ITS must be considered”, says Beat Schweizer, Deputy Director-General of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

The International Commission, whose eleven member states control the Tracing Service in Arolsen, has asked the working group to “identify the future structural and organisational challenges to the ITS, with a view of presenting proposals on how to address these challenges“. A first written progress report on the group’s findings is due to be published at the next Annual Meeting in London in May 2009. The member states, the ICRC and the ITS will take part in the working group. Chairman will be ambassador Pieter Jan Wolthers from the Netherlands.

“Setting up the working group is a logical consequence of the 2006 decision to open the archives for historical research. This has a direct effect on the areas in which the Tracing Service operates, and raises the question of the future role of the International Tracing Service and its administration by the International Committee of the Red Cross“, says the current Chairman of the Commission, Polish ambassador Krzysztof Kocel. “In view of the magnitude and significance of the historically valuable evidence contained in the documents at Arolsen, we are aware of the responsibility of the International Commission”. It is now the turn of Great Britain to take over the Chair for the next twelve months.

The International Commission also considered the progress of digitisation of the documents at ITS. This is a requirement for the unanimously agreed transfer of the data to the member states, and is due to be completed in 2011. At present, the ITS is in the process of completing digitisation of the documents dealing with forced labourers. At the same time, scanning of the documents from camps for Displaced Persons DPs has begun; DPs were persons who survived concentration camps or forced labour camps, and some were prisoners of war released when the Second World War ended. 70 per cent of the material in the keeping of the ITS is now available in digital form. “The three main tasks, and those to which the ITS will be giving priority in the immediate future, are ensuring a fast and reliable response to enquiries, thorough and systematic digitisation of all documents, and developing historical research“, says ITS director Reto Meister.

Contact

Kathrin Flor
Head of Communication
Grosse Allee 5-9
34454 Bad Arolsen
Germany
Tel.: +49 (0)5691 629 116
Mobile: +49 (0)170 900 84 95
Fax: +49 (0)5691 629 501
E-Mail: communications[at] its-arolsen.org

About the International Tracing Service

The International Tracing Service in Bad Arolsen aids both victims of Nazi persecution and their relatives by keeping a documentary record of their respective fates in its archives. The ITS preserves this historical evidence and makes it available and accessible to researchers.

The ITS is under the control of the eleven member states of the International Commission for the International Tracing Service (Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Poland, Great Britain, the USA), under the terms of the Bonn Agreements of 1955 and the amendment protocol of 2006. The ITS is run and organised on behalf of the Commission by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

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