Subject: Petition on WWII-German Reparations and Occupation Loan

Destruction of Kalavryta

Please go to http://www.greece.org/blogs/wwii/ to read the full petition (short | long) and the supporting material.  Please sign this petition requesting the German government to honor its long-overdue obligations to Greece by repaying the forcibly obtained occupation loan, and by paying war reparations proportional to the material damages, atrocities and plundering committed by the German war machine.

 

The Gorgopotamos Bridge

During WW-II Germany and Italy obtained forcibly from Greece a loan (occupation loan) of $ 3.5 billion. After the end of the war, at the Paris Conference of 1946 Greece was awarded $ 7.1 billion, out of $ 14.0 billion requested, for war reparations. Italy repaid to Greece its share of the occupation loan, and Germany paid war reparations to Poland in 1956 and to former Yugoslavia in 1971. Greece demanded from Germany payment of the occupation loan in 1945, 1946, 1947, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1974, 1987, and in 1995. However, Germany is consistently refusing to pay its obligations to Greece arising from the occupation loan and war reparations.

Bombing of Pireus Port

It is estimated that the current value of the occupation loan is $163.8 billion and that of the war reparations is $332 billion. The French economist and consultant to the French government Jacques Delpla stated on July 2, 2011, that Germany owes to Greece 575 billion euros from Second World War obligations. The German economic historian Dr. Albrecht Ritschl warned Germany to take a more chaste approach in the euro crisis of 2008-2011, as it could face renewed and justified demands for WWII reparations.

The objective of this petition is to raise international awareness of the refusal of Germany to honor these legal obligations to Greece, and create pressure from the international community on Germany to fulfill its obligations. Please ask also your friends and colleagues to sign the petition. It is very critical to get as many as possible signatures from non-Greeks.