FUNK: Yes, I mentioned it yesterday. I said so yesterday...
THE PRESIDENT: He said that just now. He said that he had spoken about the Czechoslovakian gold deposits.
MR. COUNSELLOR RAGINSKY: Mr. President, he did not mention Czechoslovakia yesterday and I am asking him this question today. But if he replies to this question in the affirmative, I shall not interrogate him any further on the matter, since he will have confirmed it.
[Turning to the defendant.] I now pass on to the next question, to the question of Yugoslavia. On 14 April 1941, that is, prior to the complete occupation of Yugoslavia, the Commander-in-Chief of the German Army issued a directive for the occupied Yugoslav territories. This is Exhibit USSR-140; it has already been submitted to the Tribunal. Subparagraph 9 of this directive determines the compulsory rate of Yugoslav exchange—20 Yugoslav dinars to the German mark. And the same compulsory rate of exchange, which had been applied to the Yugoslav dinar, was also applied to the Reich credit notes issued by the Reich Foreign Currency Institute.
These currency operations permitted the German invaders to export from Yugoslavia at a very cheap rate various merchandise as well as other valuables. Similar operations were carried out in all the Occupied Eastern Territories, and I ask you: Do you admit that such operations were one of the means for the economic spoliation of the Occupied Eastern Territories?
FUNK: No.
MR. COUNSELLOR RAGINSKY: Very well.
FUNK: That depends on the relation of the exchange rate. In some cases, in particular in the case of France, I protested against the underevaluation...
MR. COUNSELLOR RAGINSKY: Excuse me just one minute, Defendant Funk. You have already spoken about France and I do not want to take up the time of the Tribunal unnecessarily. I think you ought to answer my question.
FUNK: At the moment I do not know what the exchange rate between the dinar and the mark was at that time. In general, insofar as I had anything to do with it—I did not make the directive; that came from the Minister of Finance and from the Armed Forces—insofar as I had anything to do with it I always urged that the rate should not differ too greatly from the rate which existed and which was based on the purchasing power. At the moment I cannot say what the exchange rate for dinars was at that time. Of course, Reich credit notes had to be introduced with the troops because otherwise we would have had to issue special requisition vouchers, and that would have been much worse than introducing an official means of payment, as is now being done here in Germany by the Allies, because working with requisition vouchers is much more disadvantageous and harmful for the population and the entire country than working with a recognized means of payment. We invented the Reich credit notes ourselves.