Former UN leader dies

Kurt Waldheim, a former United Nations chief and Austrian president whose reputation was tarnished by disclosures he had hidden his past in Nazi Germany's officer corps, died on Thursday aged 88.
The Austrian presidency and a Waldheim family spokesman announced his death following a short illness. The domestic APA news agency said he had died of heart failure, quoting Waldheim's son-in-law. Waldheim was head of the United Nations for much of the 1970s before becoming Austrian president, a largely ceremonial role.
Waldheim admitted concealing his service with Hitler's army in the Balkans but always denied knowing of Nazi war crimes committed there at the time, including deportations of thousands of Greek Jews.
Most Austrians did not believe Waldheim was linked to Nazi atrocities. In fact, the accusations boosted his poll ratings as president. But they also made him persona non grata in many countries and he made almost no state visits during his tenure.
"Kurt Waldheim left this world with a huge question mark about his past and his activities during World War Two," said Ephraim Zuroff, Israel director of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre. "He was in a position to know about Holocaust crimes and didn't do anything to stop them, and loyally served the Nazi regime."
Waldheim said later the furore over his 1986-92 presidency had in fact forced Austrians to face up to the fact that they were not all passive victims of Nazi Germany, which annexed Austria virtually without resistance.
During Austria's 1986 presidential election, news magazine Profil published his old military registration card with stamps suggesting he had belonged to the Nazi Brownshirts, Hitler's paramilitary street force, before World War Two. Profil said it had also found evidence Waldheim had served in the Balkans in 1942-45, much of this under General Alexander Lohr, who was executed for war crimes in 1947.
Waldheim's published accounts of his life had implied his Wehrmacht career had ended in 1941 after he was wounded on the Russian front. Waldheim denied knowing that thousands of Greek Jews were deported from the port of Thessaloniki, just six km (four miles) from where he was based for many months.