From the forerunners of document collection to the trial of Klaus Barbie and beyond: the transitional justice journey of the Izieu telegram

This article analyses the journey of the so-called Izieu telegram–atelegram sent by Nazi perpetrator Klaus Barbie to report the raidof a Jewish children’s home in France to his superiors–from itscreation to its use in multiple transitional justice mechanisms,including an international military tribunal, domestic trials inFrance, and various memorialisation projects. In doing so weapply the concepts of activation and the records continuumapproach, both borrowed from archival studies scholarship, toanalyse how an individual record becomes continuouslyrecontextualised through its use in transitional justice processesand in the process contributes to those same processes. Weconclude by highlighting both the benefits of bringing archivalconcepts into dialogue with transitional justice scholarship andpractice, and the tensions inherent in that endeavour.