EXIT PERMITS FROM OCCUPIED COUNTRIES. (Hansard, 24 November 1942)

§ THE MINISTER OF ECONOMIC WARFARE (THE EARL OF SELBORNE)

My Lords, for several months past evidence has been reaching His Majesty's Government that the enemy is organizing a considerable traffic in the sale of exit permits from occupied countries, particularly from the Netherlands. Partners, business associates, relatives or friends of persons in such territories who themselves live in neutral or Allied countries are informed that the persons concerned will be granted visas and facilities for leaving German-occupied Europe if payment is made in the currency of a neutral country. Sometimes the information comes in the form of a request for assistance from the person in occupied territory, sometimes those in the neutral or Allied countries receive it from agents of the German Government. The sums demanded are in the neighbourhood of £5,000 per head, and in a number of cases it is stated expressly or by implication that, if the money is not paid, those concerned will be treated as hostages and they and their families will be sent to concentration camps.

The evidence which has reached His Majesty's Government and the United States and Netherlands Governments leaves no room for doubt that this traffic is being organized by the German Government and its agents on a considerable scale in order to increase the enemy's resources of foreign currency. While His Majesty's Government might on humanitarian 196 grounds have been prepared to overlook isolated instances of payments made to the enemy in the above-mentioned circumstances, it is clear that the matter has reached the dimensions of a regular organized traffic, from which the enemy hopes to derive marked benefit. Indeed, the fact that he has been obliged to resort to this action is a measure both of the difficulties in which he finds himself as a result of the Allied financial blockade and of the advantage that would accrue to him from any serious breach of it.

Quite apart from the detriment to the blockade which would be involved by any condonation of this traffic, His Majesty's Government feel that to acquiesce in it would, in the long run, prove the worst service that could be rendered to potential victims in occupied territories. It is the universal experience that surrender to blackmail merely increases the appetite of the blackmailer. There are still many persons in occupied Europe with wealthy friends, relatives or business associates abroad, and to permit this situation to be exploited will merely add to the sum of human misery among the peoples now under German domination. In these circumstances His Majesty's Government, after consultation with the United States and Netherlands Governments, have decided that they must regard all persons who make payments to the enemy in consequence of this traffic and all persons furthering it or facilitating it in any way as being engaged in transactions for the benefit of the enemy. They therefore wish to make it clear (1) that they will immediately place upon the Statutory List and thereby proclaim as enemies any persons in neutral countries or in any other territories to which the List applies who act as brokers or agents in this traffic; (2) that persons in such countries or territories who pay money to the enemy or his agents in pursuance of this traffic are performing a service to the enemy and will render themselves liable to all such legitimate penalties and counter-measures as it may be within the power of the United Nations to take; (3) that any person in the United Kingdom who makes payment to or for the benefit of the enemy in these or any circumstances is liable to prosecution under the Trading with the Enemy Act.