German capitalist defends Hitler era forced labour

This 16 May 2019 video by German right-wing daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung is about the scandal of a present owner of the Bahlsen corporation defending nazi era forced labour.

From daiy The Morning Star in Britain:

Thursday, May 16, 2019

German biscuit company forced to apologise after her gloats about wealth made from nazi forced labour

GERMAN biscuit company Bahlsen was forced to apologise after one of its owners said the firm “did nothing wrong” in using forced labour during the nazi era.

Verena Bahlsen conceded that her remarks were inappropriate after she was accused of being “oblivious to history.”

…

The controversy started after Verena Bahlsen gloated at a conference last week: “I’m a capitalist. I own a quarter of Bahlsen, that’s great. I want to buy a sailing yacht

According to the video: ‘sailing yachts’ (plural).

and stuff like that.”

After she was criticised for insensitivity to the fact that her vast wealth was made with the use of forced labour, she said the company had nothing to feel guilty about.

“That was before my time, and we paid the forced labourers exactly as much as German workers and we treated them well,” she told German newspaper Bild.

Bahlsen used around 200 forced labourers between 1943 and 1945. Most of them were women from nazi-occupied Ukraine.

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But former forced labourers have failed in a bid to receive compensation from Bahlsen with German courts citing statute of limitation laws.

Social Democratic Party general secretary Lars Klingbeil said: “Someone who inherits such great wealth also inherits responsibility and should not be so arrogant.”

The Nazi Forced Labour Documentation Centre in Berlin said: “The issue of nazi forced labour is often still a blind spot in the collective memory.”

German billionaire family that owns U.S. brands Krispy Kreme, Dr Pepper and Calgon had ‘disgusting’ Nazi past. Published: March 26, 2019 at 6:20 a.m. ET. By Rachel Koning Beals. JAB Holding, which also owns Panera Bread, Peet’s Coffee and Clearasil, turns out to have had deeper pro-Hitler connections