“Article 31: The work furnished by the prisoners of war. . . .”
THE PRESIDENT: We consider these documents as official and sufficiently authentic.
M. HERZOG: These rules of international law determine positively the legal powers of the nation having prisoners of war in its custody. It is legitimate to force prisoners of war to work during their captivity, but this includes three legal limitations:
1. It is forbidden to compel noncommissioned officers who are prisoners to work, unless they have expressly requested to do so.
2. War prisoners must not be used for dangerous work.
3. Prisoners must not be associated with the enemy war effort.
The National Socialist authorities systematically neglected these imperative provisions. They exercised violent constraint on noncommissioned officers held in captivity, to force them to join labor crews. They included war prisoners as workers in their factories and in the workyards, without considering the nature of the work imposed upon them. The utilization of war prisoners by National Socialist Germany took place under illegal and criminal conditions. This I affirm and I will prove it to the Tribunal.
THE PRESIDENT: We will take a recess for 10 minutes.