A Catholic seminary in Rome has opened its wartime archives to shed light on a notorious Austrian bishop who supported the Nazis.
Bishop Alois Hudal, who died in 1963, was the director of the Pan-Germanic College of Santa Maria dell' Anima in Rome between 1923 and 1952. The college is the main training centre in Rome for German priests.
The priest openly declared his pro-Nazi views and has been labelled the "Black Bishop" by Simon Wiesenthal, the Nazi hunter whose foundation gathered evidence against him.
Inside the vault, historians from the Institute for Austrian History in Rome found a copy of a telegram sent to Adolf Hitler by Hudal supporting the annexation of Austria.
The archive also confirms that Hudal helped many German soldiers escape to South America. Among those he is suspected of helping is Franz Stangl, commander of the Treblinka death camp.
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