61340 Vorabseiten_e - Unabhängige Expertenkommission Schweiz

country were subjected, was finally abolished. Gradually most of them were
released from the internment camps and given cantonal residence permits
which granted them the right to take on gainful employment. On the whole,
the former refugees were grateful that they had survived the war in Switzerland.
As to what had transpired beforehand, this can probably be summed up in a
statement made by the Committee of Experts for Refugee Matters in March
1945:
«Over the past 4 years we have been able to give the refugees a roof over
their heads, clothing and food [...] but we have not managed to make them
feel happy in Switzerland.» 156
Asset management
The refugees’ stay in Switzerland was characterised by supervision and the
removal of personal responsibility. This clearly emerges from the fact that the
authorities confiscated the refugees’ valuables and cash once they crossed the
border and their assets were handed over to the Federal Department of Justice
and Police to be administered.
The legal basis for this policy was provided by the Federal Council’s Decree of
12 March 1943, according to which cash exceeding 100 francs, securities, and
valuables belonging to refugees who had entered Switzerland after 1 August
1942, were to be put under the control of the Federal authorities. Even before
this date, however, asylum seekers had been forced to hand over their assets, with
dubious legal justification; 157 in this sense, the Decree of March 1943 provided
a legal basis for a procedure which was already being carried out in practice, but
at the same time had proved to be problematic. On the one hand, confiscated
assets disappeared, and on the other it can be shown from a list drawn up by the
territorial command in Geneva, that in at least ten cases refugees whose modest
assets had been confiscated in the reception camp were subsequently deported
without their money having been handed back to them. 158
Since the Decree of March 1943 applied only to those refugees who had entered
Switzerland after August 1942, the Police Division attempted to obtain information
about the assets of refugees and emigrants who had arrived earlier. The
banks consistently applied the banking secrecy which, however, did not stop the
Police Division from obtaining the information they wanted by citing the
Federal Council’s Decree of 17 October 1939. If refugees did not respect the
regulations concerning the handing over of their assets, they ran the risk of
being deported or interned in a correctional institution. The Swiss Volksbank
(SVB), a bank with a nationwide network of branches, was charged with
managing the confiscated assets.
158