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State Attorney Bach: Mr. Freudiger, you told us that you sent a copy of that report you received about the horrors of Auschwitz, to Horthy, amongst others. Was any particular change noticeable at any time in Horthy's attitude to the deportation of Jews from Hungary?
Witness Freudiger: At the end of June there was already the beginning of some resistance in Hungarian political circles to the deportation of the Jews from Hungary. Apart from that, to my knowledge, at the end of July, possibly on 26 June, a very strong ultimatum from Roosevelt and from the King of Sweden was received by the Swiss minister, Jaeger, addressed to the Hungarian Government and to Horthy personally, that they should immediately put an end to the deportations. And if they did not stop the deportations - thus the ultimatum was reported to have stated - Hungary would be treated in a way that a civilized nation had never been treated before. As far as we knew, the ultimatum expired on 29 or 30 June, and the Hungarian Government did not give any reply at all.
On 2 July there was a very heavy air raid on Budapest. British and American planes began arriving from early morning; there were roughly 500 casualties amongst the population of Budapest, including many Jews as well. Our house, too, was hit by a bomb, and my cousin, whom I have mentioned, died in our house after having been struck by the bomb.
Q. Do you know whether after that Horthy gave a particular order?
A. On the next day, 3 or 4 July, Horthy stated in his reply to Jaeger that, from 9 July onwards, there would be no more deportations from Hungary. In fact, perhaps he did not know, but he surely must have known, that, apart from Budapest, the deportation programme had been concluded by that date. The last stage was already due to take place that week. This was in Western Hungary.
Q. That is to say, the Jews of Budapest actually survived?
A. The Jews of Budapest survived.
Q. How many Jews were there in Budapest then?
A. I think there were approximately 200,000 or 150,000 persons.



Freudiger ne mentionne pas la lettre du Pape dont il avait pourtaqnt connaissance. Cette lettre est, me semble-t-il, essentielle (par souci historique car je suis un mecreant). J'ai en effet des raisons de douter que le diplomate Suisse Jaeger (le heros qui a couvert l'action de Lutz) ait ete encore en poste a Budapest a cette date mais je dois verifier. Par ailleurs la declaration de Franklin Roosevelt pre-datait les deux lettres de Gustav V et du pape de plusieurs semaines et la BBC l'avait tronque tant dans son contenu que dans le nombre de diffusion. En ce qui concerne les bombardements, si celui auquel Freudiger (un autre vrai heros de la Vaada avec Joel Brand, Reszo Kasztner etc...) est bien etabli, il convient de souligner qu'il n'etait pas le premier et qu"il ne fut pas le plus violent: il est donc peu probable que le lien de cause a effet dont parle Freudiger ait existe.