Necdet Kent

İsmail Necdet Kent (1 January 1911 – 20 September 2002) was a Turkish diplomat, who claimed to have risked his life to save Jews during World War II.

These claims, first published in an appendix to Stanford J. Shaw's book Turkey and the Holocaust (1993),[2] have not been independently verified; no survivors or their descendants have confirmed the account.

[4][5][6][7] Necdet Kent was born in 1911 in Istanbul in the Ottoman Empire and got his secondary education from Galatasaray Lycee, as did some of his colleagues in the foreign ministry.

"[11][9] Kent approached the Gestapo commander at the station, and demanded that the Jews be released, as they were Turkish citizens and Turkey was neutral.

[4] Historian Corry Guttstadt examines the claims made, concluding that "Kent's heroic action is just completely unfounded".

The International Raoul Wallenberg Foundation researched the role of Turkish diplomats during the Holocaust, reporting: to date, it was not possible to receive any independent, objective third party corroboration to the self-testimony of Mr. Necdet Kent, regarding his having boarded a Nazi deportation train and released a number of Turkish Jews from deportation or death.

[14] In 2001, Kent, Namık Kemal Yolga and Selahattin Ülkümen, also Turkish diplomats who had worked in Europe and saved Jews during World War II, were honoured with Turkey's Supreme Service Medal.