A German historian has been stripped of a writing award after she was accused of inventing Jewish family members who supposedly died in the Holocaust.
Marie Sophie Hingst, who lives in Ireland, wrote a blog called "Read on my dear, read" about how her grandmother's family was all but wiped out in the Shoah. She even travelled to Israel to register 22 relatives whose deaths she claimed to have confirmed.
Dr Hingst, 31, was named blogger of the year in the country's Golden Blogger awards in 2017. But organisers have now withdrawn this after another academic researched her claims and found discrepancies.
Genealogist Dr Gabriele Bergner established Dr Hingst's grandmother was a Christian and was married to a pastor. Dr Bergner also claimed at least six of those whose deaths Dr Hingst regisered at Yad Vashem did not exist.
