00:00I was officially born on the 14th January 1944 in Lublin, in the ghetto.
00:09Most of the people said to me,
00:12give Christian to Polish people, he doesn't survive.
00:18In 1940, the Nazis deported Christian Pfahl's family,
00:22because they belonged to the Sinti and Roma community.
00:26Some of his relatives were murdered in Auschwitz.
00:29Against all odds, Christian Pfahl, his parents and siblings survived.
00:34Sinti and Roma had lost their homes and businesses because of the Nazis,
00:39yet they continued to face racism upon their return to Germany.
00:49This memorial to the Sinti and Roma victims of the Nazi genocide
00:53commemorates the roughly 500,000 members of the community
00:57murdered across Europe.
01:00Nevertheless, in 1956, Germany's highest court denied them compensation.
01:05The judges claimed Sinti and Roma weren't persecuted on racial grounds,
01:09but as a crime prevention measure.
01:12The court said they tend to criminality, especially to theft and fraud.
01:16Jane Weiss, herself a Sinti, researched how postwar Germany's courts,
01:21politics and administration remained full of former Nazis.
01:26In Bezug auf Restitution von Vermögen oder eben die Entschädigung für erlittenes Unrecht,
01:37sahen sie sich teilweise denselben Personen gegenüber,
01:44die sie erst ins KZ gebracht haben und dafür gesorgt haben,
01:48dass sie dann eben deportiert wurden oder eben sterilisiert wurden.
01:53Diese Situation ist für uns eigentlich heute noch unvorstellbar.
01:57Welches Empfinden von Machtlosigkeit müssen eigentlich die Menschen gehabt haben,
02:02als sie das erlebten?
02:04Christian Pfahl and his family also struggled to receive compensation.
02:09Ich weiß, meine Mutter, die wurde 53 Jahre alt,
02:12ist an den Folgen von einem Schlag auf den Kopf im KZ dran gestorben.
02:18Meine ganzen Geschwister konnten nicht mehr arbeiten gehen,
02:21mein Vater war sterbenskrank und keine Entschädigung bekommen.
02:26Finally, in 1982, Germany's then-Chancellor Helmut Schmidt
02:30officially recognized the genocide,
02:32but by then many survivors had already died.
02:35Since the early 2000s, Christian Pfahl has received a small amount of compensation.
02:40Even at 81, Pfahl continues to fight against racism and forgetting.
02:45For this year's Roma Genocide Remembrance Day,
02:48he will travel to Auschwitz to speak with young people.
02:51Ja, es schmerzt, es tut weh,
02:54aber es ist auch sehr wichtig, dass ich da bin als Überlebender,
02:58um meine Stimme zu erheben, zu sprechen, zu warnen.
03:02Amen.
03:03Amen.
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