The Claims Conference in New York City has announced a three-year, €5 million ($5.57 million) pledge from the Alfred Landecker Foundation and the Reimann family in support of emergency assistance for Holocaust survivors.

The Claims Conference, which provides compensation payments to Holocaust survivors, will absorb 100 percent of the administrative costs associated with management and distribution of the funds.

Several years ago, members of the Reimann family, one of the wealthiest in Germany and the owner of several well-known brands, including Krispy Kreme and Peet's Coffee through the privately held JAB Holding Co., appointed an independent historian, Dr. Paul Erker of Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich, to research the family's political history as well as that of the Benckiser company, the precursor to JAB Holding. The research uncovered the fact that the company had used forced labor in its factories during World War II and that company leaders Albert Reimann, Sr., and his son, Albert Jr., were ardent supporters of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime and outspoken in their anti-Semitism. In acknowledgement of that history, the family established the foundation earlier this year and has committed to distribute €10 million in humanitarian assistance to survivors of the Holocaust.

The foundation was named in honor of Alfred Landecker, who died at the hands of Germans when he was deported in 1942. Landecker's daughter, Emilie, had three children with Albert Reimann, Jr.

"As survivors age, their needs are growing ever greater. Our goal is to identify every funding source available to ensure more care and more programs for survivors," said Claims Conference executive vice president Greg Schneider. "The funding from the Reimann family through the Alfred Landecker Foundation will help bring us closer to that goal."

"We are delighted to partner with the world-respected Claims Conference to help realize our much-needed financial commitment to survivors of the Holocaust," said Landecker Foundation chair David Kamenetzky. "This also marks a significant step for the...foundation and our ambition of researching and remembering the atrocities of the Holocaust, as well as providing humanitarian assistance for survivors of the Holocaust and former forced labor in World War II."

(Photo credit: Claims Conference)