Dutch Waffen SS member aged 91 charged with 1944 murder

A Dutch national who joined the Nazi Waffen SS and now lives in Germany has been charged with the 1944 murder of a Dutch resistance fighter, according to international news agency AP.


Siert Bruins, 91, is accused of killing resistance leader Aldert Klaas Dijkema, who was shot dead near the German border.
Bruins, who now has German nationality, was convicted of murdering two Dutch Jews in 1980 and served eight years in jail. He was sentenced to death in absentia by the Dutch courts in 1949 which was later commuted to life imprisonment.
Efforts to have him brought back to the Netherlands failed because Germany does not extradite its own citizens.
A court in the German town of Hagen will now determine if the case should go to trial.
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