RP seeks recognition for helping Jews escape Nazis

The Philippines said yesterday it was seeking formal recognition of its role in helping Jews escape Nazi Europe during the holocaust.

"The Filipino people welcomed Jewish refugees to the Philippines at a time when the rest of the world slammed its doors to a people seeking safe sanctuary from Nazi tyranny," Filipino envoy to Israel Antonio Modena said in a statement issued by the foreign department.

"Surely the Filipino people should be recognized for upholding a high sense of morality and humanity," he added.

Manuel Quezon, then president of a US-administered Southeast Asian commonwealth, set up a housing project for Jewish refugees in suburban Manila shortly before World War II, the department said.

Some 1,850 German and Austrian Jews later took refuge in Manila, it added.

Modena said Avner Shalev, chairman and curator of the Yad Vashem, a memorial in Israel to the six million Jews murdered by Nazis in World War II, told him that "some form of recognition should be made for the role played by the Filipinos and the Philippines in saving some of the Jews from the jaws of death in Nazi concentration camps."— AFP