Ostarbeiter
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Ostarbeiter was a Nazi German designation for millions of foreign workers deported from the occupied Soviet Union for slave labor in Germany during World War II. The program was a war crime and a crim
Woman with an Ostarbeiter badge at the Auschwitz subsidiary IG-Farbenwerke factory (Nazi propaganda image)
"Nationality badges" (Volkstumabzeichen) of Ostarbeiter from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus colored in accordance with their national flags: blue Saint Andrew's cross on white within a red oval (white-blue-red flag of Russia), yellow within blue badge with the Ukrainian trident and white and red badge in accordance to the white-red-white flag of Belarus. The badges were legally introduced on 19 June 1944 as replacements for the "OST" badges and practically implemented seemingly only after February 1945.
Nazi propaganda caption: "A 14-year-old youth from Ukraine repairs damaged motor vehicles in a Berlin workshop of the German Wehrmacht. January 1945."
Forced laborers before departure, Ukraine, May 1942
During World War II, Nazi birthing centres for foreign workers, known in German as Ausländerkinder-Pflegestätte, Ostarbeiterkinderpflegestätten, or Säuglingsheim were German institutions used as stati
Ostarbeiter
…extremely common and led to tens of thousands of pregnancies caused by rape. The victims began giving so many unwanted births that hundreds of special Nazi birthing centres for foreign workers had to be created in order to dispose of their infants. Nazi authorities attempted to reproduce such conditions on farms, ordering farmers to integrate…
Commemorative plaque at the entrance to the former NSDAP home in Velpke where 76 Polish and 15 Soviet babies were killed by starvation in 1944
Medical checkup before departure to unknown German slave markets; already pregnant foreigners were not allowed entry into Germany.
Preoccupied with their new babies, foreign labourers could no longer work for the benefit of the Nazis.