JEWISH REFUGEES

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 2, Issue 107, 8 January 1940, Page 7

JEWISH REFUGEES

ASKED TO RETURN TO GERMANY Jewish refugees with technical training, who passed through Panama recently, were approached by the German Consul and asked to return to Germany. The story was told by a refugee who arrived in Sydney by liner, accompanied by his wife. They are on their way to Melbourne to live. The refugees asked that their names should not be published. They have relatives living in Germany. When their steamer arrived at Panama the German Consul camc aboard with a printed appeal from Germany asking doctors and technical experts to return to the fatherland on most advantageous terms. The consul canvassed a number of the refugees on the liner. All the refugees read the appeal and told the consul that, although Germany might be short of experts, they would not risk returning there. The refugee who told the story was a motor mechanic who had been in business for many years in a German city. Nazi persecution lost him his business. He and his wife, after considerable difficulty, obtained papers to leave the country, but it cost them everything they possessed, even their jewellery. Then they were put over the Dutch border, each with 10 marks.