Jews and members of other minority groups held in concentration camps and restricted areas in occupied Europe are being systematically pillaged by their Nazi captors of sums of money sent them by relatives and friends in the outside world, Chairman Sol Bloom of the House Foreign Affairs Committee charged today in an interview.
“One of the principal objectives in placing these people in areas where they would be under close supervision was to expedite the plunder of funds which the Nazis were certain they could secure,” he declared.
A large part of the money comes from this country, but it is being received from other points throughout the world, he continued. “The amount sent is invaluable, but there is definite knowledge that most of it goes to provide the Nazi Government with foreign exchange,” the Congressman said, describing the procedure as another form of “Hitler s blackmail of the civilized world.”
The New Yorker also criticized attacks on the alleged slowness with which the refugee problem is being acted upon by the U.S. “The State Department and the President’s Advisory Committee are doing a wonderful job within the limits of the care that must be exercised,” he declared. “This Government is fully aware of the fact that Hitler was seized upon refugee movements to cloak the infiltration of subversive agents into the democratic countries of the world and we are taking every precaution to see that our aid for refugees does not result in damage to our own country.”
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