Nazi hunter says most wanted criminal Dr Death is in Chile

Published on Wednesday 9 July 2008 10:30

THE Simon Wiesenthal Centre has strong evidence that the world's most wanted Second World War criminal, known as "Dr Death", is in southern Chile or Argentina, a top Nazi hunter says.

Efraim Zuroff, the centre's director in Israel, will fly to the southern Chilean city of Puerto Montt today, where SS concentration camp doctor Aribert Heim's daughter has lived for years.

Mr Zuroff and the centre's Latin America director Sergio Widder will then travel to Bariloche, across the Andes in Argentina, on Friday.

Searchers think Heim is alive, Mr Zuroff says, because a bank account with 800,000 and other investments in Heim's name in Berlin have not been claimed by his children. To do that, they would have to produce proof that Heim was dead.

Mr Zuroff said the centre had received information "that has strong potential" to help efforts to find Heim. Heim, who would be 94, tops the centre's list of most-wanted Nazi war criminals. A reward of nearly 250,000 is being offered jointly by the centre and the German and Austrian governments for information leading to his capture.

Heim was indicted in Germany on charges that he murdered hundreds of inmates at Mauthausen concentration camp.