Germany: Nazi Sex Slavery Exhibition

Ravensbrück was a concentration camp for women


RAVENSBRUCK, GERMANY -- An exhibition on sexual slavery under the Nazis will open Sunday at the former Ravensbrück concentration camp, organizers said.

The Foundation of Brandenburg Memorials, which operates museums at the former camps, said in a statement Thursday that the forced prostitution system in the camps was a "little known phenomenon."

"The female prisoners who were forced to do sex work remained silent after 1945 about their experiences as well as about the brothel users -- male, and above all German, prisoners who were allowed by the SS to visit the brothels under a rewards system," the foundation said.

"Forced Sex Work in Nazi Concentration Camps" covers a system that ran in 10 camps between 1942 and 1945. Most of the women involved were prisoners at Ravensbrück, about 100 kilometers (60 miles) north of Berlin.

Male prisoners were allowed visits to the sex slaves to boost their productivity in the Nazi arms factories during World War II.

The foundation said that encouraging sex with women was also a means of curbing homosexuality, which the Nazis feared would "break out" among male prisoners confined to their own camps...

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