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Eleven days
after the Anschluss, as the persecution spree ruled out the
possibility of an orderly departure of refugees from Germany and
Austria, President Roosevelt proposed an international conference at
Evian, on the shore of Lake Geneva in France, to ease the emigration
of refugees and to establish a new international organization that
would elaborate an overall solution to the refugee problem.
Roosevelt noted that none of the participating countries should be
expected to modify its refugee admission policy.
Between
July 6-15, representatives of 29 states met in Evian to discuss the
international refugee problem. 24 voluntary organizations also
attended, as observers, many of whom presented plans orally and in
writing. The conference was governmental; neither the refugees
themselves nor representative organizations of refugees
participated. The various countries’ delegates explained why they
could not take in masses of refugees from Germany and Austria. The
conference achieved almost no success in opening any country’s
gates to the refugees, and by the time it adjourned, there was a
public consensus that it had failed to find them a safe haven. |
