Last remaining member of Hitler assassination plot dies
GERMANY: Ewald Heinrich von Kleist, a former German army lieutenant
who took part in a plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler, has died at the age
of 90, a think tank he co-founded said Wednesday.
Von Kleist, who was arrested after the 1944 bid to remove Hitler and
sent to a concentration camp, died last Friday in the southern German
city of Munich, a spokesman for the Munich Security Conference said.
Under the “20 July” plot, German army officers teamed up with members
of the resistance including trade unionists to try to blow up Hitler at
Rastenburg, in Eastern Prussia, now part of Poland.
Among the key plotters was Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg -- played by
American Hollywood actor Tom Cruise in the 2008 film “Valkyrie” about
the failed assassination --, who had personally recruited von Kleist.
Von Kleist was 22 at the time and volunteered to wear a suicide vest
at a meeting with Hilter. But the plot failed and Hitler survived
although he was injured in the blast. Leading members of the plot were
arrested shortly afterwards and executed.
Von Kleist was imprisoned at the Bendlerblock building in Berlin
where the plot had been hatched and today is used by the defence
ministry, before he was sent to Ravensbrueck concentration camp. After
the Second World War, he studied law and economics and went into
publishing.
He was also a co-founder of the Munich Security Conference, which
annually brings together global defence and foreign policy chiefs.
AFP
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