The web publishing simplify the process, paving the way for anyone to enter this universe and find out, by simply pressing a key, if a relative, neighbor or acquaintance is named in documents 
. Experts say the move is part of a recent process of French society to put aside the myths and misrepresentations about the occupation and resistance, and assume the events of the time as they were.
But they also warn about the risk of open access the files will lead some to draw wrong conclusions about people who betrayed and provided information incriminating to the police.
Digitization cover various Paris police files from general reports to track individuals, transcripts of interviews or letters of denunciation of Jews, Communists or resistant "are crucial documents," said Denis Peschanski, historian and director of research at the National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS by its French acronym).
"show, especially the highly professional Paris police and the role of the French police for their cooperation with the occupiers, "he said Peschanski the BBC.
From basement to the network
files have been stored for decades in the soil at the Museum of the Prefecture of Police, in the heart of Paris, and until now access to them is restricted.
While many sensitive documents were destroyed after the liberation of France, thousands more were stored in boxes and classified for 75 years by a government decision after the war. This period will begin to expire in 2015 for documents dated 1940 and in subsequent years for the rest of the material.
Although some years were allowed access to the material, conditions were established as requests for prior authorization and justification that made the process complex for ordinary people.
However, some researchers and historians as Peschanski have been diving into boxes for specific tasks, such as books or documentaries.
"Myths"
French police gave crucial support to the Nazi forces and the Vichy regime installed after the fall of Paris and the signing of the armistice with Germany in June 1940.
police forces were led by René Bousquet, defined by the SS commander Heinrich Himmler as a valuable collaborator, assassinated in 1993 when they went to try him for crimes against humanity. An estimated 77,000 Jews were deported from France to Nazi concentration camps.
After the liberation of Paris in 1944, the authorities and French society in general and assume full avoided analyzing what happened during the occupation.
But Peschanski argues that in the '70s began a different process that is "accelerated" in the past to review and understand this black page in history.
"We accept this inheritance: the speech that France was in London or in the resistance, will integrate the fact that France was also at Vichy," he said.
Berlière Jean-Marc, a French historian, expert on the role of police during the occupation, said that "France was too long with a lot of lies about what happened in the war."
"We tell stories worth of stories of Santa Claus and provoke the existence of myths," said Berlière the BBC. The historian has expressed satisfaction that "a total and complete knowledge" of what happened.
Moral judgments
The process that France has to digest its past has been significant milestones.
In 1995 the then French President Jacques Chirac spoke of his country's role in the Shoah and last year the State Council, the highest French court recognized the "responsibility" of the country in the Holocaust. This year, a film recreated the events of the Rafle du Vel d'Hiv, 1942, when French police raided some 13,000 Jews (more than 4,000 were children) to take them to a velodrome and concentration camps.
For many, the realization of this film in France some time ago was unthinkable.
However, experts are worried about the next step that France is preparing to scan and put online from the archives of the Paris police.
"People are going to go to find out who complained, causing arrest or talked during his arrest: that is a problem," said Berlière. "Can we trust unprepared complex documents to people with no experience?".
In those years, he added, there were Jews who denounced Jews because their families were hostages, and strong resistance who denounced his tactics because they believed it was more worthy of bandits or terrorists.
"We must always be wary of moral judgments," said Peschanski.
"We can say that there were people who spoke or interrogations under torture or very hard," he said. "People talk was the rule, not moral judgments ... The amazing thing is that there were those who did not speak."
Source:
http://www.war2hobby.cl/noticias.php/id/996
0 comments:
Post a Comment