NKVD special camp Nr. 7

{{Short description|NKVD special camp that operated in Weesow and Sachsenhausen}}

File:Museum Sowjetisches Speziallager (Soviet Special Camp Museum) - geo.hlipp.de - 2963.jpg

NKVD special camp Nr. 7 was a NKVD special camp that operated in {{ill|Weesow|de}} until August 1945 and in Sachsenhausen from August 1945 until the spring of 1950.

{{cite book

|first=Kai

|last=Cornelius

|title=Vom spurlosen Verschwindenlassen zur Benachrichtigungspflicht bei Festnahmen

|trans-title=From disappearance without a trace to the obligation to notify when arrested

|publisher=BWV Verlag

|year=2004

|page=126

|isbn=3-8305-1165-5

}} It was used by the Soviet occupying forces to detain those viewed as enemies of the people by the Soviet regime.

In August 1945, the Special Camp Nr. 7 was moved to Sachsenhausen, the area of the former Nazi Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Under the NKVD, Nazi functionaries were held in the camp, as were political prisoners and inmates sentenced by the Soviet Military Tribunal.{{Citation needed|date=February 2009}} By 1948, Sachsenhausen, now renamed Special Camp No. 1, was the largest of four special camps in the Soviet occupation zone. The 60,000 people interned over five years included 6,000 German officers transferred from Western Allied camps.{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2001/12/17/world/ex-death-camp-tells-story-of-nazi-and-soviet-horrors.html |title=Ex-Death Camp Tells Story Of Nazi and Soviet Horrors |last=Butler |first=Desmond |date=17 December 2001 |newspaper=The New York Times |accessdate=2009-04-22}}

After the fall of East Germany it was possible to do excavations in the former camps. In Sachsenhausen the bodies of 12,500 victims were found, mostly children, adolescents and elderly people.{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1992/09/24/world/germans-find-mass-graves-at-an-ex-soviet-camp.html |title=Germans Find Mass Graves at an Ex-Soviet Camp |last=Kinzer |first=Stephen |date=24 September 1992 |newspaper=The New York Times |accessdate=2009-04-22}}

By the time the camp closed in the spring of 1950, at least 12,000 had died of malnutrition and disease.{{cite web |url=http://www.stiftung-bg.de/gums/en/geschichte/speziallager/spezial01.htm |title=The Soviet special camp No.7 / No. 1 1945 - 1950 |archive-date=14 May 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110514220237/http://www.stiftung-bg.de/gums/en/geschichte/speziallager/spezial01.htm |publisher=Stiftung Brandenburgische Gedenkstätten |accessdate=2009-04-22}}