Tag #156636 - Interview #102599 (Gyorgyike Hasko)

Sometime in the middle of January the Soviet troops liberated the international ghetto. I have just read that there was a Swedish [protected] house, from where they took the people to the banks of the Danube. At that time, I thought that all the Swedish houses survivied. We knew that there was a Swiss house [Editor’s note: The activity of the Swiss diplomats to save Jews was organized around the embassy. The Swiss consul in Budapest was Carl Lutz in 1944-1945. The Schutzbrief, the safe conduct for the Jewish refugees from Budapest was his idea. He saved 10000 Jewish children, whom they sent to Palestine, with these safe-conducts. He issued more than 50000 safe-conducts without a permission. Besides this he played a role in establishing the 76 so called protected houses in Budapest. Jewish refugee agencies estimate the number of Jews saved by him at 50000. Consul Lutz’s temporary agent in Budapest, dr. Peter Zurcher prevented the SS from exterminating the 70000 inhabitants of the ghetto before the Soviet occupation.], and Spanish house from where they took the people to the banks of the Danube and shot them into the Danube, but they didn’t take us. [Editor’s note: Angel Sans Briz, who was a Spanish ambassador in Budapest in 1944 issued 500-700 safe-conducts and approved the establishing of several dozens of Spanish houses in Budapest. By the end of the war more than 3000 Jews escaped with the papers of the Spanish embassy.] We escaped. We were liberated.