Medal of Merit for SS assassin

- An embarrassing mistake by the city council of the municipality of English Fire in Germany. Last weekend a year ago, aged 94-year-old Wilhelm Kusterer received an award pinned to social achievements in the municipality. Now the man turns out, however, in Italy to be sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment for genocide. Also justice in Germany is since 2013 the corridors after the former SS sergeant.

The congregation knew nothing about the past of the man assures mayor Bastian Rosenau.,, This information is completely new to us, '' said the mayor. After noise also from Italy, where Kusterer would have participated in the murder of more than eight hundred people in 1944, it is up to the council to decide whether the award is withdrawn.

Members of the Italian-German group of parliamentarians reacted aghast at the revelation.,, Especially in this time of flashing right-wing populism in Europe '', it is painful that a war criminal gets such an award.,, The massacre of Marzabotto was the worst war crime on Italian soil during World War II, '' said Laura Garavini chairman of the parliamentary group.