The insolvency estate of Nazi era poison gas maker IG Farben I.L. has settled a dispute with German investment and real estate firm WCM for half a million euros ($616,000) in damages, WCM said on Monday. Farben, which made the killer gas used in Adolf Hitler's extermination camps, had taken WCM to court for backing out of a deal to buy 479 apartments from it. Survivors of the camps—in which IG Farben had also operated production sites—have tried for decades to get compensation out of the remnants of the company. The company's insolvency means that the proceeds of selling IG Farben's assets are likely to be used to pay off bank debt. A spokesman for WCM said that it had not bought the apartments because their condition had deteriorated. IG Farben filed for insolvency in November 2003 after a decades-long liquidation process. It says that WCM's decision not to buy the properties was the reason for its insolvency. —Reuters
