INDEPENDENT COMMISSION OF EXPERTS
SWITZERLAND - WORLD WAR II

Switzerland and Gold Transactions in the Second World War: Interim Report

Victim gold: new figures and new findings

Bern/Zurich, 25 May 1998. The Independent Commission of Experts: Switzerland - Second World War made public its interim report on "Switzerland and gold Transactions in the Second World War" on Monday, in Zurich. The report reveals new, important findings concerning, for instance, shipments of victim gold by the German Reichsbank to Switzerland.

On the basis of documents which were discovered in the United States in 1997, the Commission has obtained new figures for the amount of gold coming from concentration and extermination camps which arrived in Switzerland via the German central bank. The amount of gold comprised in the shipments of SS Captain Bruno Melmer which the German central bank delivered to its deposit account at the SNB in Bern came to 119.5 kilograms of fine gold. This corresponded to a sum of 134,428 US dollars or the equivalent of 581,899 Swiss francs. The other recipients of this gold were the Deutsche Bank, the Dresdner Bank, the Degussa company, and the Consorzio Esportazioni Aeronautiche. The answer to the question of who subsequently acquired the victim gold that the German Reichsbank sent to its deposit account at the SNB in Bern, remains unknown. The question of whether victim gold was moved to Switzerland via other channels also remains unanswered.

There are no indications that the directors of the SNB were aware of the origin of this gold which, in appearance, was no different from that of other deliveries. As of 1941, the board of governors became increasingly aware that Jews and other persecuted groups were being robbed, and in 1943, at the latest, the SNB had knowledge of the systematic extermination of victims of the Nazi regime. Nonetheless, SNB decision-makers neglected taking measures to distinguish looted gold from the other gold holdings of the Reichsbank.