1. Mr. Kawczynski, could you explain us in a few words how this Swiss Fund for Needy Victims for the Holocaust came to be, especially in the context of Roma victims and whether you were informed and involved in its creation.

The Swiss Fund for Needy Victims of the Holocaust Shoah was created by the Swiss Government in February 1997 under international pressure and its funds were given by the government, Swiss Banks, the Swiss National Bank as well as by the Swiss Industry. All in all, this fund received more than 270 million Swiss francs 12 % of which were to be given to non-Jewish victims of the Holocaust, with a strong priority for Roma victims. We were informed of both the creation of this fund by one of our corresponding association. We were never contacted directly by the Swiss Task Force, the governmental organisation in charge of the creation of the fund and were presented with a "fait accompli".

Four structures exist in this fund. First, its direction - a presidium with 7 members chosen by the Swiss Federal Council. They decide on the distribution of funds upon the recommendations of the board of experts as well as oversees the payments and other tasks. Second a board of 18 experts who are deciding on the actual distribution of funds and lastly, a secretariat in charge of organisational matters as well as verification. The money, this humanitarian help, was to be, from the very beginning, to be distributed by partner organisations who should and did submit lists of victims. This structure is ripe with conflicts of interest as some of these partner organisations are sitting in the board of experts as they are to decide on their own funding. The use of partner organisations to submit lists and distribute the funds opens the door to all sort of corruption. But also think of the pressure on an organisation, most of them with little funding to actually have to verify and select the victims, without any means of doing so, choose to whom to give and see their final decision in the hands of the fund itself. And then also have to distribute these funds. Shouldn't the selection process lie within the fund itself? After all, they have the power of decision. This is actually demeaning to those organisations and transforms them in policing institutions.

From the beginning, it was clear to us that the structure of the fund was wrong. We would have liked to see a foundation established, that is, an organisation by which the victims would have received funds directly without intermediary from the interests on the principal, and where the role of partners organisations would have been limited to proposing, collecting and submitting lists of potential recipients. That way, we could have avoided the corruption as well as the lack of funds as these were from the beginning clearly not sufficient for all the Roma victims. Unfortunately, the proposal of some organisations to organise a round-table with several Roma organisations was not accepted by the Fund. One of our most important wish was to see a transparent structure, one in which numbers, places and the entire workings are open to external scrutiny, something that the Fund clearly is not.

In view of our position on the structure of the fund, the answer is clearly no. We did not wish to and could not become involved in a structure were corruption and mismanagement was bound to happen and we were unfortunately proved right. The only thing we did was to submit a short list of Roma victims, 7 names, so as to see how the actual process worked but we will come back to this.

Through our network of partner organisations we received information that some Roma Polish victims of the Holocaust were paid 1'500 Polish Zlotys (about 600 SFr.) instead of the full complement of 1'500.- SFr. they were entitled to. This was in the beginning of the summer of 1998. These Roma actually gave a procuration to a legal representative to represent their rights and informed the Fund of this fact. Nothing happened. The fund now claims that they undertook a verification of these allegations and that everything was alright. In fact, they are even now saying that part of this distribution was made in presence of Atag, Ernst and Young and are thus false. Think of the price these verifications cost, several hundreds of dollars per hour, in comparison with the actual distribution. Well, anyhow, more and more Roma came and complained - we have around 200 such statements. In spite of the pressure and threats these people were submitted to by the partner organisation of the fund, already have 29 agreed to come forward and go to court. So we are faced on the one had with the victims who are claiming they did not receive their money and with a stone wall on the side of the fund as everything was alright. We had to intervene and help the victims so as to find out what was going on.

We want to find out the truth, what happened and force the Swiss Fund for Needy Victims to acknowledge the fact that it has not done its job, namely secure that they their funds reached the true beneficiaries, the victims. One cannot but ask that if they are so vehemently defending themselves on this matter, what happened with the rest of the money. We have heard many other such rumours but they are difficult to verify, something we are undertaking currently. We were stonewalled, by phone, the victims were shunted out, so we were left with but one option, going to court to clear the matter out.

Yes, we did, many times. Our member organisations in Tarnow and Cracow, for example started it and kept contacts with the fund. We also warned the Swiss Delegation of the OSCE. In fact, the last time we contacted the fund was just before our press conference, previous Wednesday, where they suddenly realised we would go all the way. What was their reaction, fax us the fact that funds were granted to the list of victims we had submitted. And this, three minutes after our conversation. The irony of it is that they even paid for one of the people in the list whom they knew had died last year!

That it shows a total disregard for the victims. On the one hand we have them, claiming that they were spoiled of what is theirs and one now says that in fact, what we want to do is simply to get rid of a "competing" organisation. That's disgusting. We never wanted to be involved in the current form of the Fund and our only concern goes to the victims. We want to know the truth and prevent a repetition of such irregularities both in Switzerland or within other such organisations. The Swiss Fund proved incapable of choosing at least some of its partners organisations.

This is an idiotic statement. Isn't it a bit un-democratic, an irony coming from Switzerland? Does one need one opinion to actually work together? Does one need to be represented by one King, Emperor or President, should we imitate a single party-state? No, as for some tensions between some organisations, sometimes going as far as accusations, well, anywhere where money is played a power tool by the donators, such tensions can arise. We are open as are all our partner organisations to any scrutiny. But all this is just a way of hiding the major fact, namely that money did not reach the victims. That's the only important thing.

We want to achieve that the Roma victims of the Holocaust actually get the help they were promised. We want to see that happen and we want more transparency in the fund, which organisations were "awarded" the distribution of funds and in which countries? We have not let our idea of establishing a foundation instead. This would be truly a worthy achievement and ensure equality.

They are simple. We want to speak with the responsible people, with the overseeing body of the fund, the Swiss Federal Council and we want to see justice. If we need to come with all the victims - victims twice over, first from the Nazis, now from the fund - we will do it. It all depends on the next reactions of the funds. We are going to continue our action and go to the end.