German justice on Monday sentenced a former agent of the Stasi, the political police of the communist GDR, to ten years in prison for the murder of a Pole who tried to flee to the West 50 years ago, a judgment of historical significance.
The Berlin court has the “undoubted conviction” that Martin Naumann, 80, is the author of the shots which cost the life of the 38-year-old man as he tried to escape through the Friedrichstrasse border post in Berlin in 1974, said court president Bernd Miczajka.
Even if the shooter, aged 31 at the time of the events, did not act “for personal reasons”, he “mercilessly executed” an act “planned by the Stasi”, the formidable East German secret police during the Cold War, detailed the judge.
The German prosecutor’s office had requested twelve years in prison against the former lieutenant, now retired.
The person concerned rejected the accusation through his lawyers, who requested his acquittal, considering the evidence according to which he was the shooter insufficient. He can still appeal.
According to the head of the secret police archives in Berlin, Daniela Münkel, with Monday’s verdict he becomes the first former secret police agent in the former communist East Germany to be convicted of murder.
– Scent of Cold War –
This trial, recorded because of its historical value, has since its launch in March taken the country back to the time of the Cold War, a period during which Germany was split in two by the Iron Curtain between FRG in the West and GDR to the East.
It is the culmination of decades of laborious investigation, sometimes abandoned then reopened, also on the Polish side.
It was only made possible by the appearance of new information found by two German and Polish historians in the Stasi archives in 2016, linking Mr. Naumann to the fugitive’s death, and the discovery of new witnesses. An extradition request from Poland then prompted the Berlin public prosecutor’s office to reopen the case.
Czeslaw Kukuczka, who dreamed of a life in the “free world”, is one of at least 140 people who died between 1961 and 1989 trying to cross the Berlin Wall.
On March 29, 1974, he burst into the Polish embassy in former communist East Berlin with a fake bomb to force his departure to the West.
Alerted by Poland, the German secret police then made him believe that his release had been accepted. But just when the man thinks he has succeeded in his escape after having passed two checks without incident, agent Naumann shoots him dead, an act which earned him a decoration.
Employee of a construction company, Czeslaw Kukuczka had three children who joined as civil parties but did not attend the trial.
– “Victory of Justice”
For Filip Ganczak, the Polish historian who helped gather evidence against the condemned, this judgment constitutes “a victory for justice”, even if it comes late.
“I consider this judgment an important signal,” he said, while expressing skepticism that it would lead to “similar trials” in the future.
The Union of Associations of Victims of the Communist Regime (UOKG) welcomed the judgment, its president Dieter Dombrowski however considering it “shocking” that the prosecution had only acted at the insistence of the Polish authorities.
During the 1990s, 251 people were charged with crimes committed on behalf of the Stasi, according to government records.
Two-thirds of them, including many perpetrators such as border guards, were acquitted or the proceedings against them dropped, most of the time for lack of evidence or absence of testimony.
Only 87 were sentenced, most to light sentences.
Even Erich Mielke himself could not be convicted for his activities at the head of the Stasi from 1957 to 1989, due to lack of sufficient charges.
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