Vienna - Austria's Justice Ministry on Friday announced
rewards of 50,000 euros each for information leading to the capture
of Nazi war criminals Aribert Heim and Alois Brunner.
Brunner, now aged 95, is accused of having assisted in the
deportation of Jews from German-occupied Hungary and Greece as an
officer in the elite Nazi SS organization.
'In the rank of SS captain, part-time commander of the central
office for Jewish emigration in Vienna and through his operation in
the then occupied areas especially in Greece and Hungary, Alois
Brunner is strongly suspected of being significantly involved in the
deportation of Jewish persons with the aim of murdering them,' the
Justice Ministry stated on its website.
The statement referred to the Austrian as 'one of the coworkers of
Adolf Eichmann,' a central figure carrying out Nazi Germany's
extermination of the European Jews. Often referred to as 'Eichmann's
best man,' Brunner is believed to be living in Syria, according to
the Simon Wiesenthal Centre.
Former concentration camp medic, Heim (now 93) is believed to be
in hiding in South America and is accused of murdering hundreds of
inmates at the Mauthausen death camp via injections or organ removals
without anaesthesia.
The medic, who ran a doctor's practice in Baden-Baden in Germany
after World War II, has been on the run since 1962.
The notices, complete with photos and physical description will be
officially posted in Vienna newspapers next week, a ministry
spokesman was quoted by the Austrian Press Agency as saying.
Justice Minister Maria Berger did not rule out further rewards for
alleged Nazi war criminals.
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur 
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