Overview
- State chancellery chief Nathanael Liminski was informed by phone that the sale was off, and the auction listing and online catalog were removed from the Felzmann website.
- Polish foreign minister Radosław Sikorski and German foreign minister Johann Wadephul conferred on the case, with Poland urging handover of the materials to the Auschwitz memorial and Berlin’s envoy in Warsaw welcoming the cancellation.
- The catalog had listed more than 600 lots sourced partly from a private researcher, including letters from concentration‑camp inmates, Gestapo index cards, antisemitic posters, and a Jewish star from Buchenwald.
- The International Auschwitz Committee and the Fritz Bauer Institute condemned the planned sale as unethical and warned of privacy violations and a cynical pricing logic for highly personal documents.
- Felzmann had argued private collectors aid historical research, but after the cancellation critics pressed for provenance checks and transfer to memorial institutions, with no specific legal or restitution steps announced.