| Tilman Zülch | |
|---|---|
| Born | September 2, 1939 Libina, Sudetenland (present day Czech Republic) |
| Nationality | German |
| Occupation | General secretary of the Society for Threatened Peoples |
| Known for | Human rights activist |
Tilman Zülch (born on September 2, 1939 in Libina, Sudetenland, present day Czech Republic) is a German human rights activist. He is the founder and general secretary of the Society for Threatened Peoples.
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In 1945 he moved with his family during the postwar expulsion of Germans out of the Sudetenland. As a boy he belonged to the Bündische Jugend, part of the German Youth Movement in Hamburg. He completed his Abitur at the Gymnasium Louisenlund in the Kreis Rendsburg-Eckernförde. He studied politics and economics in Hamburg, Graz, and Heidelberg. He was active in college political groups and the Außerparlamentarische Opposition.
In June 1968, he along with Klaus Guerke founded “Aktion: Biafra Hilfe” so as to draw attention of the world to the genocide happening in Biafra, in present day Nigeria.
From this Aktion group emerged the Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) in 1970. The main office of the STP has been located in Göttingen since 1979. The STP is one of the largest human rights organizations in Europe (2006) and has advisory status at the United Nations Economic and Social Council and participant status at the Council of Europe.
Tilman Zülch feels that it is an obligation to campaign for religious and ethnic persercuted people especially for Germany in Austria given the crimes of Nazi Germany. He feels that the way for Germans to deal with the past is not to stay silent in face of other crimes such as: those of the Stalin era, the mass expulsions of Germans after 1945, or the genocides of today.
Zülch is an author of the magazine bedrohte völker (earlier the pogrom).
Texts are only available in German
Biafa, Death sentence for a People
The People That No-one Talks About
Gassed in Auschwitz, still persecuted today – the Sinti and Roma in Europe
Genocide of the Kurds
Ethnic Cleansing – Genocide in the cause of Greater Serbia
Resistance of the Victims – Betrayed people between Hitler and Stalin