Erika Steinbach

Erika Steinbach (born July 25, 1943) is a German conservative politician who has been representing the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the state of Hesse as a member of the Parliament of Germany, the Bundestag, since 1990. She is one of two candidates elected directly from Frankfurt. She is also a president of the Federation of Expellees. Erika Steinbach studied music and was a member of concert orchestras before becoming a fulltime politician. is the 206th day of the year (207th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1943 (MCMXLIII) was a common year starting on Friday (the link will display full 1943 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      A politician is an individual who is a formally recognized and active member of a government, or a person who influences the way a society is governed through an understanding of political power and group dynamics. ... The Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU — Christlich Demokratische Union Deutschlands) is the second largest political party in Germany. ... Location Time zone CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2) Administration Country NUTS Region DE7 Capital Wiesbaden Largest city Frankfurt Minister-President Roland Koch (Acting) (CDU) Votes in Bundesrat 5 (of 69) Basic statistics Area  21,100 km² (8,147 sq mi) Population 6,073,000 (09/2007)[1]  - Density 288 /km... The House of Representatives Chamber of the Parliament of Australia in Canberra. ... Type Lower house President of the Bundestag Dr. Norbert Lammert, CDU since October 18, 2005 Members 614 Political groups Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union of Bavaria Bloc (226) Social Democratic Party of Germany (222) Free Democratic Party (61) The Left. ... For other uses, see Frankfurt (disambiguation). ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...

Offices

Steinbach has also been president of the controversial[1] Federation of Expellees (German: Bund der Vertriebenen, BdV) since 1998 (succeeding Fritz Wittmann). Since 2000, she has been a member of the national board of the CDU-Bundesvorstand. In addition, she is on the boards the Goethe-Institut, the national broadcasting company ZDF, and the Territorial Association of West Prussia. She also is chairwoman of the Centre Against Expulsions. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Dr. Fritz Wittmann (born March 21, 1933 in Plan at Marienbad, Bohemia (now part of the Czech Republic) is a German politician (CSU) and lawyer. ... Goethe in der Campagna The Goethe-Institut (GI) is a German non-profit organisation whose mission is to promote German language and culture outside of the German-speaking countries. ... Zweites Deutsches Fernsehen (Second German Television), ZDF, is a public service German television channel based in Mainz. ... The Landsmannschaft Westpreußen (Ethnic Association of West Prussia) is a federation of Heimatvertriebene since 1949 - Germans born in West Prussia, or their descendants, that found refuge in the Federal Republic of Germany after the Expulsion of Germans after World War II from Eastern Germany. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

Since 2005, she has been a member of the German parliamentary committee for human rights and humanitarian aid and spokesperson for human rights and humanitarian aid of the CDU/Christian Social Union fraction. Human rights are rights which some hold to be inalienable and belonging to all humans. ... The Christian Social Union of Bavaria ( ) is a Christian democratic political party in Germany. ...

Biography

Steinbach's father, Wilhelm Karl Hermann, was from Hanau (in Hesse, western-central Germany).^[1] . He was sent in 1941 to German occupied Rumia in Poland to serve as a technician with the rank of a Luftwaffe Feldwebel (Non-commissioned officer in the German air force) at the local airfield during the war. Rumia had been renamed Rahmel and incorporated during the German occupation of Poland into Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia administrative district by Nazi authorities. Erika's mother, Erika Hermann (née Grote), lived in Berlin but visited the town occasionally. Steinbach was born there as Erika Hermann. , Hanau is a town in the Main-Kinzig-Kreis, in Hesse, Germany. ... Location Time zone CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2) Administration Country NUTS Region DE7 Capital Wiesbaden Largest city Frankfurt Minister-President Roland Koch (Acting) (CDU) Votes in Bundesrat 5 (of 69) Basic statistics Area  21,100 km² (8,147 sq mi) Population 6,073,000 (09/2007)[1]  - Density 288 /km... Rumia (pronounce: [rumÈ‹a], Kashubian/Pomeranian: Rëmiô, German Rahmel) is a town, located in Eastern Pomerania region, north-western Poland, with some 43,000 inhabitants. ...   (German IPA: ) is a generic German term for an air force. ... Feldwebel is a German military rank which has existed since at least the 18th century with usage as a title dating to the Middle Ages. ... A non-commissioned officer (sometimes noncommissioned officer), also known as an NCO or Noncom, is an enlisted member of an armed force who has been given authority by a commissioned officer. ... Mushroom cloud from the nuclear explosion over Nagasaki rising 18 km into the air. ... The Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia (Danzig-Westpreussen) was a German administrative unit created in 1939 from Freie Stadt Danzig and Polish Pomerania. ...

In January 1944, her father was sent to the Eastern Front. In January 1945 with the beginning of Soviet Army advances on German occupied territories in Poland, Steinbach's mother, three months before the advancing Soviet army reached the area decided to leave Nazi occupied Poland and went to Schleswig-Holstein together with her children.^[2] After several years of wandering through parts of Germany, in 1948 the family found refuge in Berlin, where Steinbach's grandfather had become mayor of one of the districts. The Eastern Front was the theatre of combat between Nazi Germany and its allies against the Soviet Union during World War II. It was somewhat separate from the other theatres of the war, not only geographically, but also for its scale and ferocity. ... This article is about the armed forces of the Soviet Union. ... Reichsgau and General Governement in 1941 At the beginning of World War II, significant Polish areas were annexed by Nazi Germany. ... Schleswig-Holstein is the northernmost of the 16 Bundesländer in Germany. ... This article is about the capital of Germany. ...

The following year, Wilhelm Karl Hermann returned from Soviet captivity and the family moved to his homeland in Hanau. There, Steinbach finished her education and started studying the violin. In 1967 she had to abandon her music career due to serious bone illness. In 1972, after knowing him for nine years, she married Helmut Steinbach, the conductor of a local youth symphonic orchestra. She then graduated from a school of civil administration and moved to Frankfurt, where she started working for a Communal Evaluation Office. Frankfurt am Main [ˈfraŋkfʊrt] is the largest city in the German state of Hessen and the fifth largest city of Germany. ...

In 1974 she became the head of a sub-unit of that organization responsible for the computerization of all public libraries in Hesse. The same year she joined the Frankfurt branch of the CDU party. In 1977 she was elected a chairman of the city council and held that post until 1990, when she was elected a member of the Bundestag. Type Lower house President of the Bundestag Dr. Norbert Lammert, CDU since October 18, 2005 Members 614 Political groups Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union of Bavaria Bloc (226) Social Democratic Party of Germany (222) Free Democratic Party (61) The Left. ...

Federation of Expellees

Steinbach became noted by the press for the first time when she was among the strongest opponents of German ratification of the border treaty with Poland. In 1994 she joined the Federation of Expellees and in May 1998 became the head of that organization. To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...

As Steinbach's parents had no roots of any kind in the area of her birthplace, and her father had been only deployed there as part of his duties in the German occupation force, her birthplace was considered an accident,^[3] and the legitimacy of her speaking on behalf of the German expellees was questioned.^[4][5] However, as the 1953 German Federal Expellee Law includes all categories of people who had to leave for whatever reason the areas held by Germany during World War II, she holds officially the status of an expellee.^[6] Nevertheless, the German law included two main categories: "Vertriebene" (expellees who usually had lived in Eastern Europe for centuries; Erika Steinbach's case is uncommon since she was born in the East, however to newly arrived immigrants of "free will") and "Flüchtlinge" (people who the Nazis forcefully re-settled to an occupied area and who were consequently expelled after the war). In proportion, the number of "Vertriebene" is much higher than the number of "Flüchtlinge". Whether Erika Steinbach's parents are part of any of these two groups is questionable. Erika Steinbach's father's ancestors have roots in Silesia (not in Pomerania), yet he did not grow up there. The Federal Expellee Law (Bundesvertriebenengesetz, BVFG) is a German federal law of May 19, 1953 which regulates the rights of German refugees from Central and Eastern Europe and defines who is considered expellees. ...

Steinbach was re-elected as president of the Bund der Vertriebenen by an overwhelming majority on May 8, 2004^[7] is the 128th day of the year (129th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2004 (MMIV) was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Centre Against Expulsions

Currently she campaigns for the building of a Centre Against Expulsions (German: Zentrum gegen Vertreibungen), a memorial devoted to the victims of forced population migrations or ethnic cleansing in Europe, situated in Berlin. Initially together with the late SPD politician Peter Glotz, she chairs the Centre Against Expulsions foundation. The initiative, supported by the CDU/CSU fraction in the Bundestag, has caused much controversy, both in Germany and abroad, and has resulted in much criticism of Steinbach. This article does not cite any references or sources. ... For the video game, see Ethnic Cleansing (computer game). ... Peter Glotz Prof. ...

International criticism

Steinbach's position as head of the Federation of Expellees arouses much controversy in some countries which were occupied by Germany during the Second World War. Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000...

Steinbach's public pronouncements have been criticized for causing a deterioration in German-Polish relations due to stirring up controversy regarding the rights of Germans who were expelled from Poland after World War II.[2] This controversy has led to Steinbach's negative reputation in Poland, where she and the Centre against Expulsions are frequently associated with Nazism. One example of this was a 2003 cover montage of Polish newsmagazine Wprost that depicted her riding Chancellor Gerhard Schröder while wearing an SS uniform. [3] In 2007 Gazeta Wyborcza, a popular newspaper in Poland, reproduced a fragment of an information leaflet presenting Steinbach as a descendant of the Nazis, and reminding of recompensations for Poland for losses caused by Germans.[4](original article in Polish). Germans expelled from the Sudetenland The expulsion of Germans after World War II refers to the forced migration and ethnic cleansing of German nationals (Reichsdeutsche) and ethnic Germans (Volksdeutsche) from Germany and parts of territory formerly claimed by Germany in the first three years after World War II. The policy... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Wprost (Direct) is a weekly newsmagazine in Poland. ...   [] (born April 7, 1944), German politician, was Chancellor of Germany from 1998 to 2005. ... Uniforms of the SS Ordnertroops (Allgemeine SS) SS uniform refers to the various uniforms worn by the units and departments of the Schutzstaffel (SS) between 1925 and 1945. ... Gazeta Wyborcza (pronounce: [gazεta vibÉ”rʧa] , gazeta vibborcha) is, as of 2005, Polands second largest distribution daily newspaper (after the tabloid Fakt). ...

In 2006 she was involved in a controversial exhibition on the expulsions in Europe in the 20th century. [5][6]. The exhibition was criticized by some before it even opened. However, most visitors have called the exhibition not at all "revisionist", though some called it "amateurish". It does explicitly mention the invasion of Poland and Nazis crimes as major part of the reason for the indifferentiated expulsion of Germans from Eastern Europe. Furthermore, it also treats the expulsions of Armenians, Poles, Turks, Greeks, Latvians, Karelians, Ukrainians, Italians and other peoples - topics many Europeans are unfamiliar with. The last item of the exhibition was a reconcilitory suitcase from Poland dedicated to a peaceful Polish, German and Ukrainian future generation. A group of Polish victims of Nazis visited the exhibition and pointed out that neither Death marches (Holocaust) nor expulsion of Warsaw civilians were mentioned [7]. Dachau concentration-camp inmates on a death march through a German village in April 1945. ... The city of Warsaw was nearly destroyed in a planned way by Nazi Germany after the fall of Warsaw Uprising in 1944. ...

In May 2008 Steinbach started a serie of lectures about the "History of German Settlement in East-Middle Europe" at the University of Potsdam. However, the persisting violent protests of radical left-wing students against Steinbach's view on German history compeled her to cancel the further lectures.[8][9] A lecture on linear algebra at the Helsinki University of Technology A lecture is an oral presentation intended to present information or teach people about a particular subject, for example by a university or college teacher. ... Evolution of German linguistic area from 700 to 1950 Settlement in the East (German: ), also known as German eastward expansion, refers to the eastward migration and settlement of Germans into regions inhabited since the Great Migrations by the Balts, Romanians, Hungarians and, since about the 8th century, the Slavs. ... The New Palace campus of the University of Potsdam at the old stables The University of Potsdam is a German university, situated across four campuses in Potsdam, Brandenburg, including the New Palace of Sanssouci. ...

External links

• (German) Bundestag biography
• (German) Federation of Expellees
• Centre Against Expulsions
• The Warsaw Voice newspaper article, "Border Dispute", 2003
• Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty article about Centre Against Expulsions, 2003

References