Dutch Jew recalls lucky escape before Nazi trial

By Madeline Chambers

BERLIN (Reuters) - In 1943, David van Huiden's parents saved his life by sending him out to walk their Alsatian dog just minutes before Nazis arrested them and his 18-year-old sister and sent the Dutch Jews to their deaths.

They had calculated correctly that the Nazis would pay no attention to an 11-year-old boy with a dog -- especially one that was Germany's most popular breed. Within a month, his family had been gassed at Sobibor death camp in today's Poland.

Van Huiden survived the war with friends in the northern Netherlands pretending to be a Christian orphan and some 66 years later, he still wants justice to be done.

That's why he is going to Germany on Monday as a co-plaintiff in what will probably be Germany's last major Nazi-era war crimes trial.

John Demjanjuk, an 89-year-old former U.S. auto worker who was born in Ukraine will stand trial for helping to murder 27,900 Jews at Sobibor in 1943 -- during the time van Huiden's family were gassed.

"This man is a symbol of what happened at the time. A symbol of how they behaved like monsters," van Huiden told Reuters.

"The trial is symbolic for society. For German society and Dutch society. Too many people did not help," he said in a telephone interview from the Netherlands.

"The main thing is that this event will respect the memory of my family," he said. "This man should have the highest available punishment in Germany," he added.