Keesing's World News Archives » Breaking History  »  Europe  »  France: Death of Nazi collaborator Papon (pub. March 20, 2007)

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Maurice Papon died on Feb. 17, 2007, aged 96, in a private hospital in Paris, following heart surgery.  Papon, a French bureaucrat and cabinet minister, was the highest-ranking Frenchman to have been found guilty of collaborating in the deportation of French Jews to Nazi death camps during World War II.

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Immediate context

Papon was convicted of crimes against humanity in 1998 and stripped of all his honours in 1999.  He was sentenced to 10 years in prison, but, after fleeing to Switzerland while an appeal was heard, remained at liberty until 1999.  He was allowed to leave prison in 2002, under a French law that granted elderly prisoners in poor health the right to be released.  Papon expressed no remorse for his actions, and after his death it was revealed that he had asked to be buried wearing his Legion of Honour medal.  Despite objections from politicians and the staging of a small protest at the cemetery, he was buried along with the medal amid tight security on Feb. 21 in Gretz-Armainvilliers, south-east of Paris, where he was born.

Reaction and outlook

Papon was portrayed by journalists as someone who had followed orders and sought to advance his career at the expense of any other concern.  In the International Herald Tribune of Feb. 27 he was described as an "anti-Schindler"--the opposite of Oskar Schindler, whose efforts to save Jews from deportation from Poland was popularised by the film Schindler's List.  On March 1 former French prime minister, Raymond Barre, claimed that Papon had been turned in to a "scapegoat" and that "opposing the deportation of Jews from France was not a matter of national interest".  French politicians, including spokesmen for the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP) and the Socialist Party, expressed shock at Barre's remarks.  Barre, like Papon, had become successful following the rise of Charles de Gaulle.  De Gaulle pardoned many of those suspected of collaboration with the Nazis, including Papon and former president Francois Mitterrand.  Papon's lawyer said that the state had not disavowed Papon, resuming payment of his pension after 2003 and settling half of the amount he was ordered to pay to the families of his victims.  Michel Slitinsky, whose efforts led to the launch of the case against Papon in 1981, expressed regret that Papon had been at liberty when he died and that other French civil servants who collaborated with the Nazis had not been brought to justice.  The Reuters news agency reported on Feb. 19 that since Jan. 18, 2007, a number of French Jews who died during World War II had been reburied in the illustrious Pantheon cemetery in Paris, with a memorial reading "despite the weight of hatred and darkness that fell on France during the years of occupation, thousands of lights refused to go out".

Historical context

Maurice Arthur Jean Papon was born in 1910 in Gretz-Armainvilliers, south-east of Paris.  In 1935 he joined the civil service, working for the ministry of the interior, and by 1942 was the second most senior official in the Gironde region around Bordeaux.  He was responsible for "Jewish affairs" but immediately after World War II denied that he had helped the Nazi regime.  It was only on May 6, 1981, when a newspaper, Le Canard enchaîné, published documents signed by Papon, that his role in the deportation of at least 1,500 local Jews to the Drancy internment camp and then on to Auschwitz and other extermination camps was revealed.  He was also accused of attempting to gain favour with the Nazis by organising the deportation of over 200 Jewish children despite receiving no specific order to do this.  Papon claimed he had not known what would happen to the Jews he arrested and that he had no choice but to follow orders.  He also claimed he had worked for the Resistance and when he tried to resign from his post had been told by the Resistance that he could be of more help to them if he remained in office.  After the war Papon's political career flourished.  A protégé of Charles De Gaulle, who awarded him the Legion of Honour medal in 1961, he became prefect of the Constantinois department of Algeria in 1956, where he was responsible for the brutal suppression of Algerian separatists.  In 1958 he became chief of police in Paris, and on Oct. 17, 1961, ordered the suppression of a demonstration by Algerians, in which at least 70 people (and possibly as many as 200) were killed by the police.  He was elected to the National Assembly (the lower house of the French bicameral legislature) in 1968 and served as Minister of the Budget under prime minister Raymond Barre and president Valéry Giscard d'Estaing.  He resigned in 1981, following the revelation of his wartime record.  However, it took until 1997 to bring him to trial and until 1998 to secure a conviction.  He then fled to Switzerland, eventually serving less than three years in prison.  He continued to proclaim his innocence and in 2004 provoked controversy by wearing his Legion of Honour medal in photographs published in a magazine, despite having been stripped of the award.  He was later fined for wearing the medal.  Papon appealed against his conviction, taking his case to the highest French Court, the Cour de Cassation, claiming correct legal procedure had not been followed.  In 2004 the Cour de Cassation rejected his appeal for a retrial.

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Timeline links:

• June 2004.  The Cour de Cassation rejects Papon's appeal for a retrial for his 1998 conviction for crimes against humanity on the grounds of procedural failures.
• February 2004.  The Cour de Cassation grants Papon a limited right to appeal against his conviction based on points of law arising from his 1997-98 trial.
• February 2003.  The Cour de Cassation rejects a request by the country's Justice Ministry to return Papon to prison to serve the remainder of his 10-year term.
• September 2002.  An appeals court in Paris rules that Papon's state of health is incompatible with a continuation of his prison sentence.  Papon, said to be suffering from heart disease, is released from prison, the first beneficiary of a French law passed some six months previously.
• July 2002.  The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) rules that France has violated the human rights of Papon, then 91, by refusing to allow him to appeal against his conviction for war crimes in 1998.
• October 2001.  A plaque is unveiled commemorating Algerian pro-independence demonstrators killed in alleged police repression in the capital in 1961, which occurred when Papon was the Paris police chief.  Estimates of the number of dead range from under 50 to over 200.
• June 2001.  The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) dismisses an appeal by Papon against his 10-year prison sentence.  The court rules that although Papon had been 88 at the time of his conviction in 1998, his age was not by itself sufficient reason to release him because his general state of health remained good.
• January 2001.  The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) announces that it will speed up an appeal by Papon against his prison sentence.
• November 1999.  Papon is formally stripped of the right to wear the Legion of Honour medal.
• October 1999.  The Swiss authorities extradite Papon to France to start his 10-year prison sentence for crimes against humanity.  The Cour de Cassation rules that by fleeing to Switzerland Papon has forfeited his right of appeal.
• March 1999.  A French court dismisses a libel action by Papon against an historian, Jean-Luc Einaudi.  Einaudi had testified at Papon's trial that, as Paris police chief in 1961, Papon had ordered violent police repression of a peaceful demonstration by Algerians which had resulted in up to 200 deaths.
• April 1998.  Papon is found guilty of complicity in crimes against humanity during World War II.  He is sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment and ordered to pay Fr 4.6 million (US$1.00=6.1903 French francs as at April 3, 1998) in compensation to civil plaintiffs.  Papon's 94-day trial is the longest in modern French history.
• October 1997.   State archives relating to the killing of Algerian demonstrators in Paris during October 1961 are opened on October 17th, following comments made under oath by Papon during his trial.  According to the official record, only two people died when a peaceful demonstration was brutally suppressed by Paris police.  However, historians and Algerian organisations estimate that as many as 300 people were drowned, shot or clubbed to death by police.  In his testimony Papon, whose actions in 1961 were covered by a general amnesty, dismisses these claims.  He admits that the bodies of "15 to 20" Algerians had been recovered from the River Seine, but claims that these were "dissidents" who had been killed by other demonstrators.  The police records subsequently opened indicate that at least 90 demonstrators were killed.
• October 1997.  The trial of Papon, then 87, for complicity in crimes against humanity opens in Bordeaux, France, on October 8th.  The charges against Papon centre on his part in the death or deportation of French Jews from the Bordeaux area in 1942-44 when he was secretary-general of the Bordeaux prefecture.  On Oct. 15, however, Papon insists that he had "spent the occupation fighting for Jews".
• August 1997.  The Bordeaux High Court orders that Papon be kept under close watch until the opening of his trial.
• January 1997.  The French Supreme Court orders Papon to be tried for crimes against humanity.
• October 1996.  A court of appeal in Bordeaux, France, orders Papon to stand trial for war crimes.
• September 1988.  A French court in Bordeaux reopens a judicial inquiry into the wartime record of Papon.  He had been charged in 1983, with crimes against humanity, but the case was dropped because of legal technicalities.
• August 1981.  Allegations concerning the wartime activities of Papon are made by Le Canard enchaîné.  The newspaper publishes documents signed by Papon revealing his role in the deportation of at least 1,500 local Jews to extermination camps.
• November 1978.  Papon serves as budget minister.
• January 1967.  Papon is appointed by the cabinet as director of the Sud-Aviation aerospace company following his resignation as chief of police in Paris.
• April 1966.  Papon states that the police had had no advance knowledge of M. Ben Barka's arrival in Paris, of any possible danger to him, or of Moroccan Minister of the Interior Gen. Oufkir's visit to Paris.  Controversy over the case prompts Papon's resignation as chief of police in Paris.
• January 1966.  M. Ben Barka, Moroccan revolutionary leader, disappears while on a visit to Paris, and is thought to have been murdered by the Moroccan security services or agents.
• July 1962.  Algeria gains independence.
• 1960-1962.  Algerian separatists foment violent unrest in France.  In March 1960 a force of Muslim auxiliary police (popularly known as harkis) is formed in two Paris districts to combat the separatists and a programme of detentions and deportations and a suggested curfew are imposed on Algerians.  In protest at these measures, some 80,000 Algerians take part in demonstrations in Paris on Oct. 17, 1961, and at least three people and possibly as many as 200 are killed in clashes with the police.  Papon states that 14,394 Algerian protesters were arrested and about 2,300 would be sent back to Algeria.
• June 1956.  Papon is appointed Prefect of Constantinois and Inspector-General for the Bône and Constantinois departments in Algeria.
• 1954.  Algerians launch a separatist rebellion against France.
• December 1944.  Action is taken against collaborators in liberated France.
• July 1942.  German occupation troops, S.S. units and French police arrest between 15,000 and 18,000 Jews of foreign origin who had become naturalized French citizens, Jewish refugees from Germany and Axis-controlled countries, and non-Jewish political refugees, dragging them from their homes and herding them into concentration camps.
• September 1939.  France goes to war with Nazi Germany.