Killing on the Inner German border – a Crime against Humanity?
Killing on the Inner German border – a Crime against Humanity?

Author(s): Boris Burghardt
Subject(s): Criminal Law, International Law, Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, Criminology, History of Communism
Published by: Ústav pro studium totalitních režimů
Keywords: GDR; German Democratic Republic; Inner-German border; Firing Order;
Summary/Abstract: Were the killings on the Inner German border a crime against humanity? Twenty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, nearly two decades after the demise of the GDR, this question may seem passé. Why should we be interested in a question, when from the criminal justice point of view the issue of injustices in the GDR has been closed for a long time? We can put forward two reasons. The first is purely academic interest, without benefit, which in this concrete case gathers impetus from the fact that answers put forward to date have not been satisfactory. The second is that the border policy of the GDR regime is of such historical significance that it calls for evaluation by means of normative criteria for judging the criminal responsibility of individuals in the framework of concrete prosecutions. Clear proof of this is seen in the recently begun, passionate debate on the classification of the GDR as a country afflicted by injustice. Finally, this presentation should offer the first thoughts at this conference on to what extent the international legal category of crimes against humanity can play a role in the legal processing of the injustices of Europe ’s Communist regimes.

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