Priebke Lawyer Calls on Minister to Resign

The new attorney for former Nazi SS officer Erich Priebke lodged a formal complaint demanding that Italy’s justice minister resign for ordering his client’s rearrest hours after a military court found him guilty of involvement in the 1944 massacre of 335 Italians but then released him under a 30-year statute of limitations. Italy’s Cabinet unanimously backed Giovanni Maria Flick’s move to rearrest Priebke on a temporary detention order based on a German statement that it wanted Priebke extradited to face a war crimes trial in Germany. But defense lawyer Carlo Taormina said Germany had yet to make any formal arrest request to Italy when Priebke, 83, was detained.