ties that bind: Australia, Hungary and the case of Karoly Zentai

Examines the case of Károly Zentai, an Australian wanted for war crimes in Hungary. Explores the evidence for his extradition, the broader historical context of the Zentai case, from 1944 until the present day, and its implications for historical understanding in Hungary and Australia. In the former, the complicity of the state in the Holocaust remains subject to historical denial, drowned out by the dominant narrative of Hungarian victimhood in the war. In the latter, the migration of war criminals to the country via the mass immigration programme conducted in the Displaced Persons (DP) camps of post-war occupied Europe has been hidden by the more widely known story of rescue. Balint also explores the wider history of connection between these two countries, forged during the post-war voyages of immigrants from the DP camps in occupied Europe. She questions to what extent Zentai's extradition and possible trial would help to promote collective understanding of the ‘lessons of history’ in contemporary Australian or Hungarian society, and argues that, even in this ‘twilight time’ of Holocaust memory, such efforts are necessary, though risky, for the future as well as to do justice to the past.