I quote further proof concerning the Fort of Death in Kaunas. I begin the quotation:
“Fort Number 9 was called by the residents of Kaunas the ‘Fort of Death.’ This fort, located 6 kilometers northwest of the city, is an old iron-reinforced concrete fortification. Inside, there are numerous casements, which were used by the Germans as cells for prisoners. This fort is surrounded by a concrete wall and barbed wire.
“In the very first days after their arrival in Kaunas, the Hitlerites drove some 1,000 Soviet war prisoners into the fort and forced them to dig ditches in a field of over 5 hectares in area, at the western wall of the fort. During the months of July and August 1941, 14 ditches were dug, each of them 3 meters wide, more than 200 meters long, and more than 2 meters in depth. Those who entered Fort Number 9 never survived. In columns of several thousand people, the Hitlerites drove in there women, children, adolescents, men, and aged persons for the purpose of shooting them and burning their bodies.”
I omit the next three paragraphs and continue my quotation:
“In Fort Number 9 people of different nationalities were shot: Russians, Ukrainians, Bielorussians, Lithuanians, Poles, and Jews. The following people were shot in this fort: a deputy to the Supreme Soviet Council of the U.S.S.R., Bydzhinskiene; a deputy to the Supreme Soviet Council of the Lithuanian S.S.R., Zhibertas; and others. Besides Soviet citizens the Hitlerites exterminated French, Austrian, and Czechoslovak citizens in Fort Number 9.
“A former supervisor of Fort Number 9, the witness Naudjunas, testified:
“ ‘The first group of foreigners, numbering 4,000, arrived at the fort in December 1941. I talked to one of the women, who said that they were being transported to Russia, allegedly for work. On 10 December 1941 the extermination of foreigners began. They were ordered to leave the fort in groups of 100 people, allegedly for inoculations. Those who left for inoculations did not return. All 4,000 foreigners were shot. On 15 December 1941 another group arrived, numbering approximately 3,000 persons, which was also exterminated.’ ”
I omit the next paragraph on this page, and nearly the whole of the following page, and quote only the conclusive data:
“The Investigation Commission ascertained that the Hitlerites had exterminated in Fort Number 9 over 70,000 peaceful inhabitants.”
In numerous cases the German fascists used methods full of cruel cunning for the mass extermination of peaceful Soviet citizens. In order to prove this statement, I refer to the report of the Extraordinary State Commission for the Stavropol region, which has already been submitted to the Tribunal as Exhibit Number USSR-1 (Document Number USSR-1). The Tribunal will find this excerpt on Page 268 of the Document Book; I quote one paragraph—the second paragraph, of the text: