DR. STEINBAUER: Yesterday evening I once more studied this question, since the resolution of the Court remained in my mind to the effect that this statement by the witness, which is really the interrogation of an accused person, was admitted by the Court. In my opinion, Paragraph 21 of the Charter means something else here. I believe that a partial matter like that has no probative value, for it is theoretically possible that Christiansen could now be sentenced by the British on the grounds that his statement is not correct. Now, I do not want to delay this Tribunal, but I wish to call attention to the equivalent statement of Criminal Commissioner Munt, which I have already submitted in Document Number 77, Page 199.
Then I call your attention to another matter. The French prosecutor asserted that the Dutch secretaries general were left behind by the Dutch Government to serve as a government, and that you were not justified in interfering with the sovereignty of the Netherlands. What have you to say to that?
SEYSS-INQUART: I know nothing about that and I also believe it is of no consequence. The Netherlands capitulated, and they did so for the entire region except Zeeland.
The terms of capitulation consisted only of military details. From the civilian point of view it was unconditional surrender. I believe that on the basis of international law I was entirely justified in taking the government into my own hands.
DR. STEINBAUER: May it please the Tribunal, in this connection I should like to submit a document which takes issue with this question. This is a verdict by the Supreme Court of the Netherlands of 12 January 1942. In my final speech I shall refer to this from the legal standpoint. It will be submitted to the Tribunal in certified form in four languages through the Prosecution who have agreed to this. The Exhibit Number is 96.
Then further, the French prosecutor asserted that you carried out mass shootings and, particularly, deportations of civilian workers and the displacement of Jews, in order to weaken the biological power of the Netherlands.
SEYSS-INQUART: I believe that I can cite concrete examples which show that I had the opposite intentions. It is certain that during a war losses do arise among the population, and perhaps if I had given more attention or put up greater resistance, I might have prevented something. That this did not take place, I truly regret. But two figures are decisive: the figures for mortality and those showing the increase in the population.
Until the year 1944, the mortality rate in Holland, on the basis of the statistical data of the Netherlands Statistics Bureau, rose from 9.5 to 10 per thousand, whereas in the years 1914-18, the original rate of 12 per thousand increased to 17 per thousand, in other words by almost 50 percent even though the Dutch people were under their own Government, were not in the war, and were not under a blockade. According to the statistics which I received from the Netherlands Statistics Bureau, from 1914 to 1918 there was a decrease of about one-half. In the year of my administration, up until 1944, the population increased from 20 per thousand to 25 per thousand. That is a good one-fourth increase. Of course it is primarily the will to live of the Dutch people. But it is surely also a consequence of the measures of my civil administration.
DR. STEINBAUER: In order to prove the figures just cited by my client, I should like to submit a report of the Netherlands Central Statistics Bureau. I received this by way of the General Secretary in a German and English version, but it is not certified. The original should be in the office of the General Secretary.
SEYSS-INQUART: I should like to remark that in these statistics...