In addition to the Jewish organisations in Brussels and Antwerp, the Comité des Avocates de Belgique pour l´aide aux enfants réfugiés d´Allemagne (Belgian Committee of Lawyers for Aiding Refugee Children from Germany), which was founded on 14 January 1939, played a significant role in the Kindertransports to Belgium. As well as lobbying, it mainly focused on enabling the rescue of “non-Aryan” Christian children from the German Reich.
On 19 December 1938, when the first two Kindertransports had just arrived in Brussels and Antwerp, the respected lawyer Dr. Marguerite de Munter-Latinis (1891-1981) from Uccle sent a letter to the Belgian Minister of Justice, Joseph Pholien.
Dear Minister of Justice, a group of influential lawyers from the Belgian Bar Associations have joined forces to take the initiative in working to rescue children persecuted by the National Socialist regime in Germany. They are deeply affected by the plight of these unfortunate innocent children and have joined together without political or religious distinction.
Feeling compelled by the public outcry after German-Jewish children were being turned away at the Belgian border station in Herbesthal, Dr. Munter-Latinis announced a few weeks later the creation of the Comité des Avocates in the press. Under her chairmanship, many influential people were members of the committee, including former ministers and the rectors of the universities of Liège, Leuven and Ghent as well as the Free University of Brussels.
Founded for humanitarian and philanthropic reasons, the committee endeavoured to provide legal assistance, raised funds for the reception and accommodation of refugee children, and procured identity papers and documents. The Committee also pursued its aim of promoting an international solution to the refugee problem.
Dr. Munter-Latinis was also specifically concerned with the departure of children from the German Reich. In personal negotiations with the ministries she was able to arrange the admission of a contingent of 30 refugee children. She was focusing on a group of children who had not been considered by the Jewish aid organisations in Brussels and Antwerp: “non-Aryan”, Christian children. Some of these were Jewish children who had been baptized to escape persecution.
On 24 June 1939, 23 children were able to leave the German Reich with a Kindertransport under the auspices of the Comité des Avocates. They were between three and sixteen years old and came mainly from Vienna. In Brussels, they were taken into the care of foster parents
or placed in Catholic and Protestant institutions. On 7 July 1939 there followed another three children. AS