CONNECTING TRADE AND POLITICS: NEGOTIATIONS ON THE RELEASE OF THE GERMAN PRISONERS OF WAR IN YUGOSLAVIA AND THE FIRST WEST GERMAN-YUGOSLAV TRADE AGREEMENT OF 1949/1950

Abstract

After repatriations were officially over in January of 1949, around 1,400 German prisoners remained in Yugoslavia on charges of war crimes. Yugoslavia’s foreign political shift westward following the Cominform Resolution of 1948, paved the way for establishing productive economic, as well as political and cultural cooperation with West Germany. The first trade agreement between the two states was signed in December of 1949. In the next four months, the West German Government attempted to pressure the Yugoslav side to release the remaining German prisoners by not ratifying the agreement. Eventually, in April of 1950, the two sides reached an unofficial agreement, according to which the Yugoslav side would release its prisoners gradually and improve their living conditions, while the West Germans would ratify the trade agreement and agree to negotiate long-term economic cooperation. The last transport of German prisoners arrived from Yugoslavia in March of 1953.