Nazi Hunter Reacts To Death Of Local “Hero” SS-Waffen Soldier
Former Nazi Waffen-SS soldier Willi Huber died recently, aged 96. Having lived in New Zealand since 1953, Huber made a name for himself as one of the ‘founding fathers’ of Canterbury’s Mt Hutt ski area. Hailed as a ‘heartland hero’, locals have appeared willing to ignore his Nazi past.
In a 2017 TVNZ interview, Huber denied knowledge of the war crimes committed by the Waffen SS or German forces, or of the Nazi murder of about six million European Jews and millions of others, many of whom died in concentration camps run by the SS.
Speaking to the Holocaust and Antisemitism Foundation from Jerusalem this week, renowned Nazi Hunter and Director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center office in Jerusalem, Dr Efraim Zuroff commented:
As a historian, I can state unequivocally that serving in a Waffen-SS unit on the Eastern front, there is no way that Mr Huber could possibly not have been aware of the massive atrocities carried out by the SS and the Wehrmacht in the territories of the Soviet Union, where 1,500,000 "enemies of the Reich," primarily Jews, were murdered individually during the years 1941-1943.
Huber's statements ring incredibly hollow in the face of the historical record of the Holocaust on the Eastern front. If we add the fact that he volunteered for the SS, and his comments that Hitler was "very clever," and that he “offered [Austrians] a way out" of the hardships after World War I, it's clear that Mr. Huber was an unrepentant Nazi, who doesn't deserve any sympathy or recognition.
In the early 1990s Zuroff pushed for the New Zealand government to investigate approximately forty suspected Nazi war criminals who found refuge in New Zealand after World War II. In 1991 New Zealand set up a two-person unit to investigate the allegations, but the government was unwilling to take legal action against suspected Nazis.
In a 2018 interview, Zuroff stated that ‘New Zealand was the only Anglo-Saxon country, (out of Great Britain, United States, Canada and Australia - South Africa was not open to immigration at that time), that chose not to take legal action after a governmental inquiry into the presence of Nazis in New Zealand’.
"There was absolutely no political will to take legal action against the Nazi war criminals who emigrated to New Zealand in the late 1940s and early 1950s, posing as refugees fleeing communism.”
New Zealand’s historical willingness to grant entry and then turn a blind eye to suspected Nazi war criminals was accompanied by a reluctance to receive Jewish refugees. Obstacles faced by Jews seeking refuge in New Zealand are well documented.
Huber has been granted a lasting legacy on Mount Hutt with a ski run named in his honour along with a plaque. He was also awarded a medal by the Austrian Government in 2002 for services to skiing and to Austria.
New Zealand has a legacy too - one of shame.
