SIXTY YEARS TOO LATE FOR ANNE FRANK

Anne Frank may get posthumous Dutch citizenship
A television channel has touched off a national dispute by nominating Anne Frank as a candidate for the greatest Dutch person in history, even though the Jewish teenager who became a symbol of Dutch courage during the Nazi occupation never had Dutch citizenship. Members of parliament campaigned over the weekend to grant the young author of the renowned wartime diary posthumous citizenship. But Immigration Minister Rita Verdonk said there was no provision in the law to do so.

Some historians and even the keepers of Anne Frank's legacy agree that making her a Dutch citizen nearly 60 years after her death would not alter her place in history, and could be an unintended denigration of the tens of thousands of refugees who, like Anne's family, fled the Nazi regime but would not receive the same recognition. Anne Frank was born in Germany in 1929 and came to the Netherlands with her family in 1933. The Franks became stateless when the Nazis stripped all Jews living outside Germany of their nationality.