From the Liveblog of
Monday, June 20, 2016
‘Argentine’ splurges at Nazi relics auction: report
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleBERLIN – A buyer who says he came from Argentina spends over 600,000 euros ($680,000) on Nazi memorabilia, including one of Adolf Hitler’s uniform jackets, at a controversial auction in Germany, a report says Monday.
The mystery buyer, dressed in dark clothes and wearing a baseball cap, spends 275,000 euros ($312,000) on the jacket alone and 3,000 euros ($3,400) for a set of Hermann Goering’s silken underwear, among over 50 items he purchases, reports Bild daily.
Using the number “888,” the man outbids others on most items and dominates the Munich auction, reports Bild, which sent an undercover reporter to the event that is formally closed to the press following a public outcry.
The number evokes the neo-Nazi code “88” that marks the eighth letter of the alphabet and stands for the banned greeting “Heil Hitler.”
Last week the Central Council of Jews in Germany appealed to the auction house Hermann Historica to cancel the event, charging it was “scandalous and disgusting” to make money with Nazi relics in such an auction.
When the Bild reporter asks the top bidder who he is, the man reportedly replies in Spanish-accented English that he came “from Argentina” and has bought the items “for a museum,” but declines to give his name.
German law prohibits the open display and distribution of Nazi objects, slogans and symbols, but not their purchase or ownership, for example by researchers and collectors.
— AFP
The Times of Israel Community.