Video: A TV Trial for Waldheim

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The gray walls and imitation-marble columns gave the courtroom a properly sober atmosphere. At precisely 2 p.m. last Wednesday, five black-robed judges walked slowly to the podium and brought the proceedings to order. The prosecutor's opening statement set forth an explosive agenda: the alleged complicity of Austrian President Kurt Waldheim in Nazi war crimes during World War II. "I do not represent that his is the hand that holds the smoking pistol," said the attorney. "War crimes were committed by those men whom Waldheim served. But there will be no doubt, I submit, in your minds that Waldheim did more than make coffee for these men. His acts facilitated their crimes."

Thus began what is intended to be the most thorough inquiry so far into Waldheim's wartime record. Yet the "trial" is taking place not in a court but in a TV studio outside London. The defendant will not be present, and the judges' verdict will have no legal standing. The bulk of the proceedings, moreover, are being kept secret until they are shown on television -- edited down to a 3 1/2-hour program that will air June 5 in the U.S. on HBO, as well as in Britain and nearly 30 other countries, but not Austria.

The unusual media event may clear up -- or simply add to -- the controversy surrounding Waldheim's past. But it has already sparked a debate over the propriety of TV's donning judicial robes in an attempt to resolve a matter of & international concern. TV has staged mock trials of historical figures, but never before has it focused on a living person -- one, moreover, who has not been charged with a crime.

Evidence of Waldheim's wartime activities came to light in 1986, when he was running for the Austrian presidency. Newly discovered records showed that during World War II the former U.N. Secretary-General had served on the command staff of a German army group whose units murdered Yugoslav civilians and arranged the deportation of Greek Jews to death camps. Waldheim has admitted to his army service but denies that he knew about or participated in any war crimes. In February a commission of international historians, after studying the evidence, found no proof that Waldheim was guilty of war crimes, but concluded that he had been "excellently informed" about them and did nothing to stop them.

The TV inquiry, launched by Britain's Thames Television in collaboration with HBO, has attempted an even more thorough examination. Twenty-five researchers spent five months combing archives and interrogating witnesses in 19 countries. Their work was arduous and sometimes delicate. One investigator had to listen in silence to a five-hour anti-Jewish tirade from an unrepentant ex-Nazi in order to gain his confidence. Others tracked down a witness in Poland who agreed to meet them only at a gasoline station. Though names are being kept under wraps, 37 witnesses have been flown to London to testify at the nine-day trial. Twelve of them, according to the producers, have never before spoken publicly about the case.