gases caused by the economic havoc of the current virus pandemic. well that is your news update at this hour remember you can always stay up to date on our website w dot com where you can follow us on twitter or instagram at a d w news and i richardson in berlin that for me and the whole team here thanks so much for watching. they have been robbed of their soul that's what it feel experiences when their heritage is taken from them countless cultural artifacts one clue stolen from africa by colonialists and carted off to europe. what should be done with the stolen north from africa. stolen soul starts september 7th on g.w.

. 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 right sphere 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 learned to speak german their identities were falsified. the core trust for people i was named l.-o.

dia vitesse check from that moment on i was a leaf said that. those children are now over 80 years old and many of them still know nothing about their roots. do you know would you buy me a bizarre nissan i felt this kind of back and forth also affected my relationships few people here. much of what happened to them is still a mystery. use if so of our travels as often as he can to the place where his parents are buried. it lies outside chance to hava in southern poland.

he was just 9 years old when they die. for you i'm back i feel i'm missing the warmth of being raised by a father and mother. we want to grow brought up by strangers who were something like a family but all my life i've been missing that warmth of that embrace. his father usurped was 41. his mother french scieszka 36. when they were murdered by the nazis on this spot. their son user is now 86 years old. but he has never forgotten his childhood home. power. followed all of your skin over there was

a village house with 2 rounds it was made of wood and bricks book i wish i made the job you let me show you where the stables were and found his workshop and i could. during world war 2 use of his family he would use and partisans in the bunker 7 people lived underground here for 2 years is out then one couldn't bear out all of the above this bunker was a pipe or the air came in or not and the jews and the polish protestants got their air through this pipe of course my parents also gave them food water should be a condominium found out shows there are just aren't going to learn yet. and the whole tragedy and torture took place here. and show you how the holiday germans came into cars by soldiers in the literal times. of ali knock on the door. and ask if they're so frustrated here called mommy that's an invalid it's what they started smashing the windows

with their rifles. all the planes were broken just my mother was crying and took us children out to the you know 3. children ran behind our mom and papa we were all practically naked under shorts it was 5 o'clock in the morning it was september so it was chilly and said and the german said where the jews were the participants were 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 i would scream and yell more but there was nothing. yes that. the germans hit them with anything they could get their hands on. with a whole bunch of pitchforks. 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 bhatia mama didn't make any more sense she was reading just another

woman my father had. he been hit with a rifle the whole court yard was full of blood they dragged my mother here my father there are kids there. and they still found nothing but i sure this is not leisure not. once not just between the workshop and the stables and. i'm not sure i'm going to like that maybe 4 or 600 names for all in the middle of the courtyard and at that moment the 1st jewish women came out of. there and. then they said the other side of the house on fire. after that the soldiers shot uses 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 onwards who were deemed to be worthy of being terminal. use of sr yanina still lives in germany. on as she's german german ice. all eyes just that she corresponds to the period nordic race want blonde hair and light colored that was what the germans wanted to show our sister was lost to us forever. as a cool little sister the best one of us as in germany lined up such as. it was comes god. if you get him anything give me a good good game of you got a good back or should we do. your job we come to. be kinda

funny and to be funny. just don't get what i was little baby did you. wish he'd. 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 she can even do everyone feels nice curiosity to know what their parents looked like if you have read a breeder i don't know if i had others saw systems on the see saw so i just don't know seems to have tried everything. i did 20 archives i found nothing new nothing at all to have an issue for a guy thinks. this for decades herrmann has been trying to find out who his parents were and where he was born. he always has the support of his partner. and you

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 concert. various 13 or 14 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 life 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. birth certificate issued by nazi officials and there are dashes where the names of

his father and mother should. be. 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. when the book. 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 here like you'd sent him a document and he said no no but never took place here. this found since then harriman has discovered that he was probably called roman russia top ski 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 ward was january the 21st for the notes i had swung to say out of.

the central polish city of wood was probably the 1st station in his life. come on 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've been in the water going but you for being on an. optimist by. boredom i am. but being no one. he really was because i met him you know what you know i wouldn't want anybody. but grandma. to me when i did not have it on. critical mind is. that going to be a bold but i am kind of old of. the.

story also has ties to wards. she was 5 years old when she was brought to the youth detention camp in leeds munched as woods was called during the nazi occupation. today she's meeting up with her friend bob. the 2 women have a lot in common. and their paths 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. all you have a great map. well shall we need to find they really have plotted street it's over

here we should turn the map around like this what i thought that means my house must have been here. of the house where you remember everything of course have you ever heard of the children from duck to tash x. group i am a. 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 last spring. 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 . jets and the germans wanted to german eyes children of the area and race

are said to one yourself write. 3 people. 3 life stories. with fierce in common. all 3 are victims of heinrich humors racist mania. the right spirit s.s. visited occupied poland in 1941 and traveled through the vatican our 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 sheaves in

berlin are hundreds of documents that show the gradual development of humor strategy for the organized abduction of children. after his trip through vertigo himmler wrote to the go lighter touch of christ or. i believe it is right that small children of especially good raise from polish families because lectern 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. isabel hina mine 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 look you pointed out you know and historians want to reconstruct the roots taken by the stolen children and with them. but the fact that the nazis deliberately conceal their identities makes that a formidable task when it. is rude enough to but with the calculations like down based on the reports of how many children were transported and how many were found after the war i would estimate the number to be around $20000.00 polish children behind each one of those numbers is an individual story of a life thrown into turmoil and set on a completely different course and none fall off the norm. there are many myths about the forced 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 rights commissioner for the consolidation of german nationhood he helps to issue directives 671. it's stated. first all children informally 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 risk rife and himmler's direct subordinate. later at the nuremberg 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 to each and. all possible. 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 family 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. i knew it. was a book the memories come flooding back when all over your stands here. she

was brought to the camp together with her little sister daria. nirvana bought some michael portillo 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. at all smiles our pop our school knew we were punished for every infraction. each couple had a club and they shouted at us very loudly. we were scared of the yelling and of course the severe beating. body out of the pedal. at 6 am they woke us for roll call that counters off in germany 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 with some of our time and

a lot of. other illness that they are but it had to keep going until our supervisor had counted the entire group of children off. to the show. and often when they went through the barracks where they slept. they would find children in the beds. so. no. then called was the 1st place where all of you were sent more followed. brooke i'll. bide 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. the use of sofa 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 american as for these other letters from germany from our sister. ship she did not want to appear in person in this film or engage with the family's history that's apparent in her letters. it was a line vendor by your society so when you come to see us please please don't talk

about politics or about the war. wars you love and kisses. yes. all her letters are signed with her polish and her german name on a stock. and so germanized that she even writes in her letters that i shouldn't talk about politics or our history show you because she's embarrassed. you can still get the rope 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 richer. after the murder of their parents the 5 silver children were brought to costco you know grown cold. 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 home or out for a walk. 2 here's a thought i had lunch and you're probably tired just last year i'm looking forward so much to seeing you soon as the we're from the church. you were taught about a living a chance to hope for tomorrow or 12 at nohant. check or by my dear sister. boys your boys. those decided by stories 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. his abduction was an act of pure despotism. in the southwestern german city of fribourg hermeneutic king is paying a visit to crystal this is the. charts as a teacher but for years he has been helping him on the to 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 herrmann 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 and this. is 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. own zone of us who are not. those finish of toil i think it's great that his age he still is prepared to fight for justice because even though it's only about the symbolic sums of 2500 euros for not really it's a joke it's. according to germany's act regulating compensation for national socialist injustice that is the sum to which non jewish victims are entitled.

kemah new ticking 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 made me that's what gets me mad he used that strategy used to wait until nature takes care of it or by 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 on graduated from school studied at university and became

a mechanical engineer. but the parents never spoke to him about his background. back in chains to hoffa. use of silva 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 stuff poland has a number of funds from which the germanized children or the children of mothers who are forced laborers receive small payments. like this woman from now on she'll get 50 euros a month. for her by me not all her dearly on this is actually. 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 sharon just made by new probably by about

about dark. in the early 1990 s. germany paid $500000000.00 each marks to poland as a humanitarian gesture as it was called back then. yousef wanted to apply for money for his siblings but they needed to nina's consent. not that my sister and sorrow 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 if 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 to change change 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 as bearable in limbo. like a lot of years she had to return to poland after the war. she was 10 at the time. yes after the movie a lawyer boy actually if i always 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 who was shunted around here you couldn't speak polish and write i couldn't speak the language anymore i was the. right german swine for us

children our return was disastrous but it was understandable that poland wanted its children back jakey. after the war you mean yes. has explained she and it's extremely complicated and the western allied powers made the child's wellbeing the benchmark on the one hand and on the other hand there was the justifiable demand of the polish station that said give our children back to your thirty's found themselves and complicated legal model in terms of international law. violation they feel. alone here is back home again she lives in with gosh that's 170 kilometers northwest of road. 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. left him out of here in the album is the 1st aircraft taken with my new german moti picked me up. more. mrs louisa down. she didn't have any children of her. dark took the 6 year old to her home in stendhal in saxony on her. 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 bill home 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. 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 me abscessed they were left on the ocean so for that reason i was not

so reluctant to return to poland. spring of i wasn't afraid in your boy. but going back was hard. had forgotten her native polish. but she could communicate with her mother who spoke excellent german. was lucky that she maintained contact to her german moti. and the 2 women also became friends. was now daughter to both of them. i had 2 moments. and these 2 mamas loved each other very much. they understood each other and we all. believed the dolls when they said they had not known who early to really was. wrote to the polish red cross.

was born in poznan and after she became ill in a children's home in college was then brought to bad cold scene. that is where i picked up a little on 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. cameron 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 koreans ollie's a village near leipzig. his name then was roman rushed off screen.

living is 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 reason also served as an institution for children like airman who were abducted from poland yugoslavia in the soviet union to be taken to germany. harriman 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 or not. and with me to get him isn't. 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 was sitting with at an elegant lady was standing there. later i knew it was my foster mother. she wore a hat with a veil. and the head said all right king you can pick one of the 2 children it was and she said right away. little hammer. pay or you are fatten him out. and the head nurse said so just sign here and then you can take the child with. it. and she took my hand and we went out and took the train to let him go in the fall and let her. go that's how it went. so one of the these are you know like at a chicken farm 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. but. 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 according the defendants of that crime and describing the livin sporn organization as a welfare institution. that don't back up what sets us all here in this respect the

nuremberg trials can be seen to have made a tragic legal mistake to classify levens born which ran these children's homes as a purely charitable organization and equipped those involved the challenges from today's point of view that was that related to judicial era no class a field and child on. a lot of the toshack 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 of the catholic university of applied sciences as a living witness. as always she tells her life story in german all that will help and that is why they gave us new 1st and last names. until then i had

been allowed every time. and now i was only says it if i leave it. with a bit of a live. as her lectures have also been a form of therapy for her. it's a way of coming to terms with her own past. you're meant to be excited to set your time in germany shape she says and yet you still consider yourself polish . would you say that germany is also your homeland in a way on its. yes i think that's true it is that for me i love to come back here comments over it and i always say every country has very good people and very bad peoples and they should. retire 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 . because i'm gorgeous about the journey that i didn't sleep for a last night yes but see i respond well. the family history is likely to be a topic of the gathering. use of can't forgive jani no for denying that she's polish but he says she is and will always be his sister. sourdough genie out of the young everyone in the family loves her or not yes she's warm and empathetic over nature bodies of ours over color the princess because she's so sensitive so nice and warm article are stuck on your

pocket very cut by dark i said that's not. behrman 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. i don't think i'll find out anything but i'll keep looking. who knows maybe i'll find a nugget somewhere to live you know one koran. even in his mid eighties not knowing who his parents were is a source of unease that hammond says will never leave him. in.

paris a decision against violence in a place mongolia mannion off quit his job after the valorous c.n.n. election. like many of his colleagues are chorused the actions taken against demonstrators. what we're listening for him

and his family. focused on are of. 13 w. . to the point strong opinions clear positions international perspectives. huge protests in belarus and growing calls for the countries of foreign terror in president alexander lukashenko to step down or if he does go what impact will that have on laboring russia and its all for terry leader vladimir putin find out onto the porch to the point. that even the analysts on d w are all staying up to date don't miss our highlights w. program. online w. dot com highlights. what secrets lie behind the small. discover new adventures in the 360 degree. and explore fascinating

boreholes heritage sites. w world heritage 360 get the map now. this is the w. news live from berlin accepting the democratic nomination joe biden about soon and what he calls a season of darkness in america shores of the great honor and you know that i accept this nomination for president of the united states of america. doing so by urged americans to unite and return to optimism also coming up on the show. what

happened to russian opposition leader alexei no volley he's fighting for his life at this hour after.