I omit the following paragraph and quote the third paragraph:
“The leader of the Einsatzkommando or Sonderkommando or the company commander of the Waffen-SS and the section leader of the war correspondents are charged with the responsibility that plates, films, and prints of these photographs do not remain in the hands of individual members of these task force units.”
I skip the following part of the document in its entirety, as I consider that the quotations which have been presented are sufficient proof that the police authorities were uneasy about the fact that frequent photographing of mass executions by the German fascists gave confirmation of these executions. I beg the Tribunal for permission to start the showing of several of these photo-documents. Would you permit me to do so, Mr. President?
THE PRESIDENT: What are you waiting for, Colonel Smirnov?
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: The lights should be turned off but apparently there are some technical difficulties which are unfamiliar to me. Therefore I cannot start with the showing of the photo-documents.
THE PRESIDENT: Do you think you can go on with your statement and do the photographs after the adjournment? How long do you think the photographs will take?
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: I fully agree with you, Mr. President. I beg your permission to present evidence concerning the second part of the statement, namely, the mass annihilation by the German fascists of the citizens of the U.S.S.R., Poland, Yugoslavia, and Czechoslovakia.
The mass extermination of peaceful populations of the Soviet Union and of the countries of Eastern Europe was carried out by the German fascist criminals everywhere, as can be seen from both the official orders and the reports about the carrying out of these executions. In this regard they had the following objectives in mind:
1. Physical elimination of those sections of the population which were capable of resistance; 2. For racial reasons, that is, for the materialization of racial theories inculcating hatred of mankind; 3. For purposes of retaliation; 4. Supposedly “for the struggle against the partisans” whom the German fascists could neither catch nor destroy, and for this reason they vented the full force of their retaliatory measures on the peaceful population.
The execution of children was a particularly cruel method of Hitlerite terrorism. The use especially of torture devices for killing children was one of the prime and most despicable characteristics of the Hitlerite terror regime in the temporarily occupied territory of the Soviet Union.