IRVING FINDS HIS PRO-HITLER BOOK IN PRISON

Nazi historian Irving finds his books in Austrian jail library
David Irving, the British historian, has embarrassed Austria's judicial authorities by finding his own books in a prison library while in custody on charges of Holocaust denial.

Irving, 67, who will spend Christmas and the New Year behind bars pending trial, found two of his most contentious books in the Graz prison library after asking for something to read. He said in an interview he signed both, German translations of Hitler's War and The Destruction of Convoy PQ-17, before returning them to guards.

Josef Adam, the head of the prison, said it was "not possible" to know how the books had ended up in the 6,400-volume library, the contents of which he "could not know exactly". "Now we will dispose of the books," he said. An embarrassed justice ministry said it had known nothing about the existence of the books in the prison. "Revisionists have no place in the libraries of judicial institutes," said Christoph Pöchinger, a spokesman for Karin Gastinger, the justice minister.

Hitler's War was the first volume of Irving's two-part biography of Hitler and sought to describe the war from the dictator's point of view. The 1977 book prompted huge controversy because it portrayed Hitler in a positive light and claimed he had had no knowledge of the Holocaust.

In The Destruction of Convoy PQ-17, published in 1967, Irving blamed Capt Jack Broome for the loss of life when his convoy was destroyed while taking war materiel to the Soviet Union. Capt Broome sued Irving for libel in the High Court in 1970 and won. The book was withdrawn from circulation.

Austria issued a warrant for Irving's arrest in 1989 after he delivered two lectures disputing the existence of gas chambers in Nazi concentration camps. Denying the Holocaust in Austria is a criminal offence. If convicted, Irving could face a sentence of up to 20 years. He was arrested near Graz on Nov 11 before giving a lecture to a Right-wing student fraternity in Vienna.