The names of around 425,000 people suspected of collaborating with the Nazis during the German occupation of the Netherlands have been published online for the first time.
The names represent individuals investigated through a special legal system created near the end of World War II. Of them, more than 150,000 faced some form of punishment.
The full records of these investigations were previously only accessible by visiting the Dutch National Archives in The Hague.
The Huygens Institute, which helped digitize the archive, says this represents a major obstacle for people wanting to research the occupation of the Netherlands, which lasted from its invasion in 1940 to 1945.
“This archive contains important stories for current and future generations,” says the Huygens Institute.
“From children who want to know what their father did in the war, to historians looking into the gray areas of cooperation.”
The archive contains files on war criminals, approximately 20,000 Dutch people conscripted into the German armed forces, and alleged members of the National Socialist Movement (NSB) – the Dutch Nazi Party.
But it also contains the names of people who were found to be innocent.
This is because the archive consists of files from the special judiciary, which since 1944 has investigated suspected collaborators.
The online-only database contains the suspects' names – as well as their date and place of birth – which can only be searched using specific personal details.
He did not specify whether a specific person had been convicted, or what the suspected form of cooperation might be.
But it will tell users which file they should request to see this information if they visit the National Archives. People accessing the actual files must declare a legitimate interest in viewing them.
There has been some concern in the Netherlands about personal information relating to a sensitive period of history being freely available – leading information published online to initially be limited.
“I'm afraid there will be very bad reactions,” Rinke Smedinga, whose father was a member of the National Security Service and worked at the Westerbork camp, where people were deported to concentration camps, told Dutch online newspaper DIT.
“You should expect that. You shouldn't allow that to happen, as a kind of social experiment.”
Relatives of both collaborators and victims of the occupation must be taken into account, Tom De Smet, director of the National Archives, told DIT.
But he added: “The collaboration is still a big shock. It's not talked about. We hope that when the archives are opened, the taboo will be broken.”
In a letter to Parliament dated 19 December, Culture Minister Ebo Bruins wrote: “The openness of the archive is crucial to confronting the effects of our (the Netherlands’) difficult shared past and to address it as a society.”
The amount of information available online will be limited due to privacy concerns, and those visiting the archive in person will not be permitted to make copies. The Bruins have expressed a desire to change the law to allow more information to be released publicly.
The database website says people who may still be alive are not listed online.
