while some of the zoo's inhabitants have not yet got the hang of social distancing visitors are expected to adhere to strict guidelines despite the many restrictions in place a large number of the exhibits are open to visitors and many berliners large and small are happy to have something fun to do outside their own 4 walls. you're watching t.v. news i'm terry martin thanks for being with us. to go beyond. we're all about the stories that matter to you. today. whatever it takes. you are running. into a little bit d.w. made for minds.

september 19th $39.00 nazi germany invaded poland and for more than 5 years brought terror to much of europe with its ideology of a master race. a central figure in that campaign was rights for s.s. heinrich himmler. the leading nazi was obsessed with racial purity and came up with a plan to bolster the so-called arion race between 19411945 children were kidnapped from all over eastern europe and forcibly germanized. historians estimate that 20000 of those children came from poland alone. in nazi run children's homes they learn to speak german their identities were falsified the got trust for me for all i was named i learned here vitesse check from that moment on i was a leith's if it can be simply that. those children are now over 80

years old and many of them still know nothing about their roots. new do go mia last arnie's i felt this kind of back and forth also affected my relationships feeling. much of what happened to them is still a mystery. the use of so of our travels as often as he can to the place where his parents are buried. it lies outside chance to hover in southern poland. or. he

was just 9 years old when they die and. truly i but are i feel i'm missing the warmth of being raised by a father and mother. we were brought up by strangers who were something like a family but all my life i've been missing that warmth and for that embrace that. his father use it was 41. his mother francesca 36. when they were murdered by the nazis on the spot. their son use if is now 86 years old. but he has never forgotten his childhood home . our. 5 star would all be a school over there was a village house with 2 rounds but it was made of wood and bricks booker's i made the job you want me show you where the stables or and father's workshop and i could

. during world war 2 use of his family here did use an partisans in the bunker 7 people lived underground here for 2 years is out there who couldn't bear all of the above this bunker was a part where the air came in or not and the jews and the polish partisans got their air through this pipe of course my parents also gave them food water chevron economy a product shows they were just sort of organized and yet. and the whole tragedy and torture took place here. and show you how. the germans came going to congress soldier house and the interim cement. of allah he knocked on the door. and asked this of us live here called mommy that's really involved they started smashing the windows with their rifles so i moved in that's how it all the planes were broke up just my mother was crying and took us

children out to the very beginning we children ran behind our mama and papa we were all practically naked under shorts it was 5 o'clock in the morning it was september so it was chileans at the i.o.c. and the germans where the jews were the participants but also i only went into the barn and they had a pointy metal stick and they stuck it in the straw to see if they would hit a person who would scream and yell more but there was not they got angry yes that. the germans hit them with anything they could get their hands on it. was hopeless i'm sure which for. my mother was stabbed in the stomach 3 times with the pitchfork children while she was pregnant flesh to show their mission under 6 their 7th month well my sense is that mama didn't make any more sense she was leaving just so no one else transcona well my father had his head bashed he been hit with a rifle the whole courtyard was full of blood they dragged my mother here my father

there us kids there. and you still found nothing but i sure this is my leisure not now. it's. between the workshop stables and. i'm not sure. how they got on not that maybe 4 or 6 and hundreds for along the middle of the courtyard and at that moment the 1st jewish women came out of it. and then they said the other side of the house on friday. after that the soldiers shot use of parents dead and threw their bodies into a pit at the spot where their graves is now. the children survived after witnessing the events. then they were taken to germany like thousands of other children from 1941 on words who were deemed to be worthy of being german and. use of

sr yanina still lives in germany. or not is there she's german going to money. all i stress that she corresponds to the carry on nordic race want blonde hair and like color it was what the germans wanted. our sister was lost to us forever. as a pearl of little sister the best one of us was in germany a line up such as. it was just comes god. is real in give me a good bit in my view go. back if she wanted to keep. your job or come to an old god would be kinda fun bein and for me. just don't get what i was little baby did you not i don't. wish teen wish.

come on luther king has lived in by dear i'm in southwestern germany since he retired. where he originally came from he doesn't know whose. you know uses he can even buy everyone feels nice curiosity to know what that parents look i think you have read or read it like to know if i should rather saw systems nieces or os i just don't know seems to have tried everything. i do 20 archives i found nothing new nothing at all to have an issue from god thinks. this for decades herman has been trying to find out who his parents were and where he was born. he always has the support of his partner. and even as a child he felt that there was some mystery he was 6 years old when he was placed

with maria and her man luther king but he sensed that they were keeping something from him that. this stuff out of the way spot was hidden in my foster father's closet. and there's various 1314 year old i looked to see what was in it. yes i was always curious. and when i saw this i realized more or less what it was a part. of this. this is my that i already knew that i wanted my real parents but i didn't know how it all hung together. and then i read this document that said . mother dead. king's birth certificate issued by nazi officials there are dashes with the names of his father and mother should. his place of birth is listed as broker invertigo the site of one of the nazi run orphanages where the identities of the

abducted children were covered up. or. was the 1st place i went looking and i spoke to the can't take it he was still alive i asked him if anybody else took place like it said in the document and he said it was no no but never took place here. this found since then harriman has discovered that he was probably called roman russia tough skinned before he was placed with his foster parents was he really born on january 20th 1036 he has his doubts. i might be a year older or younger maybe i'm just 36 years old. they're just staying with documents from woods was january the 21st. i did see was a stay at. the central polish city of wood was probably the 1st station in his life. still doesn't know who gave

him up to this orphanage. but he does know that the nazis took him from here to germany. to be that you didn't just want to go on but you have been going. on all this by. boredom i am. not going north. you bring this guy was on the net and you know what you. ordered me but me. i do not. want i did not have it on. critical mind. that couldn't be a hold on i'm going to be able to take on. the. story also has ties to war which. she was 5 years old when she was brought to the

youth detention camp in let's munched as would you was called during the nazi occupation. today she's meeting up with her friend barbaro patrick a village. the 2 women have a lot in common. and their parents in life have been very similar. they've come to a school located on the site of the camp. the school director is showing them a room that commemorates the thousands of children who were interned here. like who was brought here in 1943. these. are all you have a great map. well shall we need to find a media plot to st it's over here we should turn the math around like this. i thought that means my house must have been here. the house where

you remember everything of course have you ever heard of the children from dr v. tash x. group i am of it. father was a resistance fighter executed by the nazis her mother was deported to auschwitz for her husband's actions and ended up in the machinery of the german occupiers oppression people and how long were you in the camp. i was probably here for around 8 weeks. before that in the race office in poznan and they had determined that i corresponded to the so-called area scheme jets and the germans wanted to german eyes children of the area and race. get a one result write. 3 people. 3

life stories. with this in common. all 3 are victims of heinrich humors racist mania. the race fear s.s. visited occupied poland in 1941 and traveled through the vatican to district. in 1939 poland had been carved up between the soviets and the germans. sections of the western part of the country including the so-called racecar to land were incorporated into the german reich. other regions were placed under german civil administration. himmler's vision was to make sure many of the mightiest nation in the world by bolstering the population with new progeny from abroad mainly. from eastern europe. in the bundesliga sheaf in berlin are hundreds of documents that show the gradual development of humor strategy for the organized abduction of children.

after his trip through a bar to go himmler wrote to the go lighter guys there. i believe it is right that small children of especially good raise from polish families because elected and brought up by us and special not to large children's nurseries and orphanages. i would advise starting with 2 or 3 such institutions so as to gather experience. is about heinlein is a professor of contemporary history at the university of minister. she has studied the subject of the stolen children for a number of years. she set up a europe wide research project and with colleagues has analyzed 17000 files of

foreign children found by the allies in germany after the war. on historians want to reconstruct the roots taken by the stolen children and with them as it was left but the fact that the nazis deliberately conceal their identities makes that a formidable task when it. would have nothing but i did the calculations i've done based on the records of how many children were transported and how many were found after the war and i would estimate the number to be around $20000.00 polish children can find each one of those numbers is that individual story as a life thrown into turmoil and set on a completely different course on one fell off the norm. there are many myths about the fore. german ization of foreign children one account is that they were ethnic germans that is children of german ancestry who lived outside the german reich and that only very few children were brought to germany at all. but

him or his plan did have a system as the race commissioner for the consolidation of german nationhood he helps to issue directives 671. it's dated. first all children and formerly polish orphanages are to be taken and placed in accommodations after that operation is concluded children living with polish foster parents will be examined. the directive was signed by all rich private himmler's direct subordinate. later at the nuremburg trials he claimed that there had never been a concrete plan. directive $6071.00 went to only high ranking leaders of the s.s. and the police and the corresponding s.s. leaders concerned with race and settlement policy so that the s.s. operators would be aware of how it worked it was a part of

a supposedly rational occupation and gemini ization policy that was imposed mainly on occupied poland but also one other occupied and next week. possibly off. today experts believe that our own 50000 children were abducted from across europe . cases are known from today's ukraine the czech republic and slovenia. but the largest group was from poland because the machinery of the abduction started in the bar to go district. first orphanages were searched then child welfare officials summoned all children living with foster parents for inspection. there were precise guidelines on how a racially suitable child was supposed to look 21 characteristics were examined including growth patterns the back of the head the bridge of the nose and body hair

the officials were looking for so-called arion types classified as pure nordic purif alien or nordic faily and what the nazis couldn't use were unbalanced hybrid types. and finally children were also taken away from their biological parents like . she was taken for racial examination after her mother was deported then in the autumn of 1943 she was brought to the youth detention camp in litzmannstadt to be germanized. this memorial recalls the thousands of children who lived here and were forced to do hard labor. need it. the memories come flooding back when l.o.l. stands here. she was brought to the camp together with her little sister daria. nirvana bought some i got patrol of course straight away we

weren't allowed to speak polish. we'd whisper to each other in polish but of course we couldn't make it obvious that we were speaking. my family i propose. we were punished for every infraction. couple each couple had a club and they shouted at us very loudly. we were scared of the yelling and of course the severe beating. by layouts of the pair of. sixes and they work at school roll call. counters often german which was hard for us we didn't know the numbers. that's why the roll call used to take a very long time wash near some of our time. other than yes that they are but it had to keep going until our supervisor had counted the entire group of children. and often when they went through the

barracks where we slept. they would find dead children in the beds. so. no. then called was the 1st place where all of you were sent. more followed. burkle. bad protein. thousands of children were funneled through these nazi run homes. each station represented a further step to conceal the child's real identity. dates of birth were changed names were made more german sounding. became elite civic.

her friend barbara became bearable. they were forced to forget their origins finally both were placed in german families where paradoxically they experienced the happiest years of their childhood. use of salva lives in the center of chance to hold. even know he can't accept that his sister yanina loves the nation that caused his family so much suffering america has 5 days of their letters from germany from my sister. she did not want to appear in person in this film or engage with the family's history that's apparent in her letters. there's a line vendor by your sign when you come to see us please please don't talk about politics or about the war. wars you love and kisses. yes

anita. all her letters are signed with her polish and her german name on a stock. has been so germanized that she even writes in her letters that i shouldn't talk about politics or our history show you cross because she's embarrassed. you can still get a sugar rush she doesn't want to know anything about poland or the memory of her family. or when you know she lives her life there in germany she is 4 years rich on top of that i've been trying. after the murder of their parents the 5 or so of our children were brought to court you know grown cool. you know nino was taken from there by a woman from hanover who adopted her her name was changed to anita no official records about this were preserved which is why you know it was not found after the war but her siblings never stopped looking it was 20 years before use of saw her

again since then they've met up regularly. how they're all out oh good and dark my good day my dear sister. are you would hold out for a walk. 2. here is thought i had lunch and you're probably tired just i'm looking forward so much to seeing you soon as the word for the jets. be living a chance to hope for tomorrow or 12. state. check or by my dear sister. you know shot it by story so now you've heard her voice. use of sr was carried off to germany shortly before the end of the war she didn't

undergo a racial examination the longer the war went on the less attention the german officials paid to rules and guidelines. and in his abduction was an act of pure despotism. in the southwestern german city of fribourg hermeneutic king is paying a visit to crystal. charts as a teacher but for years he has been helping him on the 2 want the german government to recognise the kidnapped children as victims of the nazi regime so that they can receive compensation. she wants founded an association representing the children's interests and he and harman have filed lawsuits together so far with no success. as a last resort they've approached germany's highest court the constitutional court.

this is this is nice is the letter i received this. just processing it. and now i have to wait for a day. you know how mom is right for just a minute suggest that we write another letter to the constitutional court saying they should speed things up a little in consideration of your age and show business and zone of us who are not . those initial toys i think it's great that at his age he's still prepared to fight for justice even though it's only about the symbolic sums of 2500 euros for not really it's a joke. according to germany's act regulating compensation for national socialist injustice that is the sum to which non jewish victims are entitled. kemah new to king considers himself a part of that group. is good for me it's not about the money but about the

recognition that this was a crime it's me that's what gets me mad he used the strategy used to wait until nature takes care of it then it's over the. german government argues that the kidnappings can be seen as general collateral damage of war and that therefore there can be no claim to compensation. and it's often argued that the kidnapped children were well treated in contrast to other victims. that was true in herremans case his german foster parents were wealthy his mother was a teacher and head of the regional association of german girls. the father was a high ranking teacher both were nazi party members. came and graduated from school studying at university and became a mechanical engineer. but the parents never spoke to him about his background. back in

chains to hoffa. use of self is on duty. for the past 30 years he's been working for an organization for the victims of nazi persecution he campaigns for them to receive compensation. for poland has a number of funds from which the germanized children or the children of mothers who were forced laborers receive small payments. like this woman from now on she'll get 50 euros a month. for her by the naacp dearly on schedule this is actually possible several hours but this letter says you will get at least 212 swatches the last show so we've been able to help here we are here saying shared by new poll longly probably about about dark. in the early 1990 s. germany paid 500000000 mark stipple and as

a humanitarian gesture as it was called back then. yousef wanted to apply for money for his siblings but they needed young men as consent. not by my sister answerable no no no i will not steal money from the german people because i am dramatically i said yes. barbara has invited a load a year to her home they want to talk about the stories of their lives that wound up taking such a similar course. but they actually asked it we all kind of like sisters. always for a long time we didn't know if we were german or pay less. but i feel as though we were both very lucky. but that a few we ended up in families that treated us like their own children and i said questioning. what. could.

barbaro was 3 when the nazis examined her and approved her for a german ization. in 1902 she was placed with a german foster family and grew up. in limbo. like a lawyer she had to return to poland after the war. she was 10 at the time. yes that's a movie a lawyer by national highways say that my war started after i went back yes i say the same. my parents were no longer alive there was nothing left. i was an unwanted child he was shunted around here and there you couldn't speak polish and write so i couldn't speak the language anymore i was this hitler go ride german swine for us children our return was disastrous but it was understandable that poland wanted its children back jiechi. after the war you mean

yes. has extreme she think it's extremely complicated and the western allied powers made the child's well being the benchmark on one hand and on the other hand there was the justifiable demand of the polish states that said give our children back to your thirties found themselves and a complicated legal model in terms of international law. listen to feel. alone here is back home again she lives in big. that's 170 kilometers northwest of roads. for years she's been giving public lectures as a witness of history. in a few days she'll be traveling again to germany to tell the story of her life. here in the album is the photograph taken when my new german moti picked me out.

more. mrs louisa. she didn't have any children of her. took the 6 year old to her home in stendhal in saxony on heart. the little girl started going to school there and lead a comfortable life as a much loved only child. 4 years later came the shock. luisa and her husband received a letter from the polish red cross which tore the family apart. louisa dahl wrote this in response. if the mother of the child is alive we are prepared in view of the mother's terrible suffering and uncertainty during the years of separation to return the child safe and sound to her. of course the biological mother has the 1st right and with

a heavy heart i will give up the child whom we have come to love and cherish. 'd polish mother. had survived auschwitz. and with this photograph searched the world for her 2 daughters. and found them. when the news came that i was a stolen polish child and had to go back to my home country. and there my musi began to tell me about my siblings who i had forgotten in the course of the 4 years . october of the abscessed they were out on the river on the ocean so for that reason i was not so reluctant to return to poland. that i had. spotted of i wasn't afraid at all or skinny

a boy or girl. but going back was hard a load you had forgotten her native polish. but she could communicate with her mother who spoke excellent german. o.d.u. was lucky that she maintained contact to her german moti. and the 2 women also became friends a low deal was now daughter to both of them. i had 2 moments. and these 2 members loved each other very much. but they understood each other as we all. believed the dolls when they said they had not known who elites are really was the reason dar wrote to the polish red cross. so was born in post 9 and after she became ill in

a children's home in college was then brought to bad policy and. that is where i picked up a little an april 25th 1944 mediated by the former lebanese born association the child was placed with me as a pure german child with a german name as an eastern german orphan for adoption. herrmann luther king's foster mother must have known that he was not a german child she got him in december 942 from zone and visa eleven's born home in corin's ali's a village near leipzig. his name then was roman russia tough ski. levin's born was a pet project of heinrich himmler. it provided

a place for unmarried women to have their babies and leave them to be raised the goal was to boost the area and population. zone and visa also served as an institution for children like airman who were abducted from poland yugoslavia and the soviet union to be taken to germany. herrmann was one of the 1st children here to be given away to families loyal to the nazi regime. he remembers how it came about. but. i used to always play with my friend all along. and with the all together and this and. all and then a nurse came and said you 2 have to come along to the head. so we went up there and the head nurse was sitting with an elegant lady who was standing. there later i

knew it was my foster mother. she wore a hat with a veil. and the head nurse said. right. you can pick one of the 2 children. and she said right away i'll take little hammer . pair are fatten him aren't typically. and the head nurse said so just sign here and then you can take the child with you and i was all in it. and she took my hand and we went out and took the train to let him go in and let her. go that's how it went. so one of the these are you know like a chicken farmer and i want down chicken that one doesn't look so good but i like that. that's how they did it with the children too or. at the time

here man was just happy that he had someone to take care of him and he got along well with maria luther king. but once he started to try and find out about his background she broke away from him. when she died in the late 1980 s. he did not attend her funeral. at the nuremberg trials american prosecutors tried to press charges for the kidnapping of alien children for purposes of german ization. but the tribunal contested the charges acquitting the defendant of that crime and describing the livin sporn organization as a welfare institution. that learned that upsets us like in this respect the nuremberg trials can be seen to have made a tragic legal mistake to classify living in spawn which ran these children's homes

as a purely charitable organization and equipped those involved with the challenges from today's point of view that was as related to the judicial era class a feel and child on. a low to return she is on her way to the city of fribourg. she knows germany well. she often visited her foster parents here. today she's giving a talk to students at the catholic university of applied sciences as a living witness. as always she tells her life story in german all that will happen and that is why they gave us new 1st and last names. until then i had been. and now i was early to say if i leave it.

alone says her lectures have also been a form of therapy for her. it's a way of coming to terms with her own past but i guess that. you're meant to be excited said that your time in germany shaky and yet you still consider yourself polish. would you say that germany is also your homeland in a way on. yes i think that's true it is that for me i love to come back here and comments over it and i always say every country has very good people and very bad people and they should. follow the of utah scheck's story is also a positive one with lots of understanding on both sides and she hopes to keep telling it for as long as she can.

today use of salva is setting off to the family get together with his sister yanina . but i'm going to have this about the journey that i didn't sleep or a last night you know sports and. the family history is likely to be a topic at the gathering. use of can't forgive yanina for denying that she's polish but he says she is and will always be his sister. saw jean are proud of our young everyone in the family loves her yes she's wrong that's not end up authentic bodies are the recall or the princess because she's so sensitive so nice and warm article or stuck in your pocket very cut costs. that shop.

i am on luther king has received a letter from the german constitutional court another defeat he has lost his fight for compensation. but he will continue to search for his roots for the parts of his life that the nazis hid from him. does he feel as how i don't think i'll find out anything but i'll keep looking. who knows maybe i'll find a nugget somewhere in a one corner. even in his mid eighties not knowing who his parents were is a source of unease that herrmann says will never leave an. eco

india. from plastic waste. it's a crude oil. spill in the end entrepreneurs have turned their country's waste problem into one of the british business their plants transforms traps into high quality leaf and eco friendly feel. eco. 39 s. w. . the city in ruins maro

a. symbol of a long conflict in the philippines. between the muslims and the christian population. against fighters occupied the city center in 2000. presidential terms was told. by the better it will never again will hold him out of. the reconquest turned into tragedy. this is not the kind of freedom that we want. to become a gateway to islamize turner. to say sorry guys are no more severe as an initial an exclusive from a destroyed sitting in the philippines in the. stars from a 20 year long t.w. .

plane . this is c w there is life from our land the logistical challenge of bringing children back to school as germany eases out of the locked out classrooms are set to begin reopening next week we will look at how teachers plan to keep their students safe during the pandemic also coming up the u.s. not just up a grim tally as confirmed coronavirus cases surpassed the 1000000 mark and in.