Stoiber defends Sudeten Germans' claims

The centre-right candidate in the German parliamentary elections, Edmund Stoiber, has urged the Czech Republic to repeal laws that led to the expulsion of three million ethnic Germans from Czechoslovakia after World War II.

Under the Benes decrees, the Germans were stripped of their citizenship, had property confiscated and were ordered out of Sudetenland, in what is now the Czech Republic.

Speaking in Nuremberg at the annual meeting of what are known as the Sudeten Germans, Mr Stoiber said anyone who defended expulsions and disenfranchisement from more than 57 years ago was not fit to call himself a European.

Mr. Stoiber, who is the regional prime minister of Bavaria where many of the Sudeten Germans settled, promised to press for the re-establishment of their rights if he wins the elections in September.

The Czech Republic has continued to defend the expulsions.

Last month, its parliament voted to uphold the decrees fearing that compensation demands would follow any repeal.

At issue is the Czech Republic's efforts to join the European Union, which Mr Stoiber 's party - the Christian Social Union - has sought to block by declaring that the decrees breach EU membership criteria.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service