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| Many women involved with German soldiers in occupied Norway were expelled or punished by the state after liberation in 1945 (AFP Photo/STR) |
Oslo (AFP)
- Norway on Wednesday officially apologised for the "shameful
treatment" of Norwegian women targeted for reprisals for their intimate
relations with German soldiers during the country's war-time occupation.
Between
30,000 to 50,000 Norwegians, commonly labelled the "German girls",
were involved with occupying troops during World War II, according to estimates
from Norway's Centre for Holocaust and Minorities Studies.
As well as
public humiliation, many of the woman were subject to reprisals by officials
after the 1945 liberation from Nazi occupation, including illegal arrests and
detentions, job dismissals and even being expelled and stripped of their
nationality.
"Young
Norwegian girls and woman who had relations with German soldiers or were
suspected of having them, were victims of shameful treatment," Norway's
Prime Minister Erna Solberg said.
"Today,
in the name of the government, I want to offer my apologies," the premier
said at an event to mark the 70th anniversary of the UN's universal declaration
of human rights.
"For
many, this was just a teenage love, for some, the love of their lives with an
enemy soldier or an innocent flirt that left its mark for the rest of their
lives."
During the
war, more than 300,000 German soldiers occupied Norway, a neutral country the
Nazis invaded on April 9, 1940. Heinrich Himmler, the Nazi SS chief, considered
Norwegians "goddesses" and encouraged his troops to have relations
with local women.
The first
"Lebensborn" reproduction centre outside Germany was set up in Norway
in 1941 as part of the Nazi Aryan race ideology.
In 2000,
Olso formally apologised to the estimated 10,000 to 12,000 children born to
Norwegian mothers and German soldiers, who also suffered reprisals.
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Norway's
Prime Minister Erna Solberg has apologised to women who suffered reprisals
after having relations with German soldiers during the country's war-time
occupation
(AFP Photo/John MACDOUGALL)
|
People in
the street
More than
70 years after the end of WWII, very few of the women remain alive and the
official apology is unlikely to open the way for financial reparations for
their families.
"The
people directly affected are no longer with us... but this also touches their
families and the children," said Reidar Gabler, son of a Norwegian woman
who was expelled in 1945 along with her German husband.
"Even
if it comes late, the apology is important for history," he told Norway's
Aftenposten newspaper
Historian
Kare Olsen said he was unaware of any similar apology in other European
countries where women suffered after their involvement with soldiers during
German occupation.
Thousands
of French women were publicly shorn after the liberation; some were detained or
executed in what were mostly extrajudicial reprisals.
"In
France, for example, these women were mistreated after the liberation, but it
was more by people in the street than by the authorities," Olsen said.
In Denmark,
historians estimate the number of woman involved with members of the German
occupying forces was around 50,000 but there were no accusations or forced expulsions.
"There
is less reason for an official apology than in Norway," said Anette
Waring, a professor at the Danish University of Roskilde.
None of the
estimated 28 Norwegian men married to German women during the war were expelled
or had their nationality taken away from them, according to historian Guri
Hjeltnes, the director of the Holocaust and Minorities Studies centre.
"We
cannot say women who had personal relations with German soldiers were helping
the German war effort," Hjeltnes said. "Their only crime was
breaking the unwritten rules."
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