United Nations: Fingering the Forgotten

They are probably the most extensive and carefully documented files on Nazi war crimes in existence. Yet for decades the 40,000 dossiers, compiled by the 17-country War Crimes Commission at the end of World War II, have been gathering dust on the eighth floor of a United Nations office building in New York City. Next week Secretary-General Perez de Cuellar will decide whether researchers and historians will be given access to the confidential records, which were "discovered" by Israeli officials last year. The documents sparked the controversy over the alleged participation in Nazi war crimes of Kurt Waldheim, the former U.N....