Jules Jaspar

Jules Jaspar was a diplomat of the Belgian Foreign Office and businessman. He belonged to an eminent family in Belgium and was famous in the Belgian political world. His brother, Henri Jaspar, was Prime Minister of Belgium from 1926 to 1931 and his nephew was the Belgian diplomat Marcel-Henri Jaspar. Another brother was the eminent architect Ernest Jaspar. In 1939, he established the Brussels based Foreign Excellent Raincoat Company that was being used as cover for Soviet espionage operations. Following the German invasion of Belgium, Jaspar fled to Paris where he helped establish the black market trading firm of Simex. In December 1941 he moved to Marseille to open a branch of Simex. On 12 November 1942, he was arrested and sent to Auschwitz concentration camp and survived the war.