DR. STEINBAUER: You have also been accused of imposing collective penalties in the form of fines, which is contrary to international law.
SEYSS-INQUART: Collective fines are prohibited under international law only in case of individual offenses. The large collective fine of 18 million guilders was imposed in connection with the general strike in Amsterdam, Arnhem, and Hilversum, in which the entire population took part. Later, I had collective fines paid back whenever it was discovered that definite individuals were responsible for the offense.
DR. STEINBAUER: Can you give us any example?
SEYSS-INQUART: I think witness Schwebel will be able to tell you that. It was in towns in the south of Holland where it happened.
DR. STEINBAUER: You are also accused by the Prosecution of responsibility for what happened in the hostage camp in Michelsgestel. What have you to say to that?
SEYSS-INQUART: I can take full and absolute responsibility for what happened in the hostage camp in St. Michelsgestel. It was not a hostage camp in the actual sense of the word: I took Dutchmen into custody only when they had shown themselves to be active in resistance movements. The camp at St. Michelsgestel was not a prison. I visited it. The inmates of the camp played golf. They were given leave, in the case of urgent family affairs or business matters. Not a single one of them was ever shot. I think the majority of the present Dutch Ministers were at St. Michelsgestel. It was a sort of protective custody to temporarily hinder them from continuing their anti-German activities.
DR. STEINBAUER: In addition to this you are said to have prohibited the reading of pastoral letters, and to have put Catholic priests and Lutheran ministers in concentration camps?
SEYSS-INQUART: It is true that I prohibited one pastoral letter, which may happen in times of occupation—because it publicly opposed the measures of the occupational power and incited people to disobedience. That was an isolated case, and it never happened again—for the good reason, too, that there were no more provocations of such a kind in the pastoral letters. In fact, I even intervened and canceled the prohibition issued by the Police, whenever it was a matter only of a criticism toward the measures taken by the occupational powers, and there was no incitement to resistance.
I myself never sent priests to concentration camps. On the contrary, at the beginning of 1943 after having made repeated urgent requests, I finally received a list from the Security Police with the names of the priests who were shut up in concentration camps. There were 45 or 50 of them altogether. Three or four were mentioned as having died in the concentration camp. On the grounds of the facts of their case, I sought out about a third of them and demanded their release; for the second third I demanded investigation within the coming 6 months; and it was only as far as the last third was concerned that it was impossible for me to intervene without violating my own responsibility towards the Reich.
Dutch hostages were also taken for purposes of reprisal. When the Netherlands came into the war, the Germans in the Dutch East Indies were put into prison and allegedly mistreated. The Reich demanded the arrest of 3,000 Dutchmen. The Security Police arrested 800 and took them to Buchenwald. When I heard that the mortality was high, I made such urgent appeals that the hostages were finally returned. They were then accommodated in such a way that one could no longer talk of a prison. They were given leave, and when necessary I released them. In the end, I had less than 100.