For 60 years the International Tracing Service (ITS), located in Bad Arolsen, Germany, has held the largest closed Holocaust archive of documents in the world. For most of its existence the archive has been accessible only to Holocaust victims’ family members while scholars were banned. But now, under the terms of a new treaty, the ITS will begin to distribute in electronic format some 13.5 million documents related to concentration camp records. The new treaty states that each country can designate only one repository to handle the material. According to a press release, the Holocaust Memorial Museum located in Washington, D.C., will be the American home to the records. While the museum staff will need to have extensive training and upgrades to its computer systems, documents may be available to scholars as soon as this fall.

More on this story can be found at the New York Times. The treaty and documents related can be found on the ITS web site.

This post first appeared on AHA Today.