Magazine Closes Over Holocaust Item

TOKYO —  When a glossy Japanese magazine printed an article last week titled “There Were No Nazi ‘Gas Chambers,’ ” it was not surprising that angry criticism sprang up around the world. What was surprising was the extent of the reaction here: The publisher apologized, recalled the issue--and shut down the magazine for good.

Bungei Shunju Co., one of Japan’s most respected magazine firms, said Monday that it will immediately cease publication of Marco Polo, a monthly magazine of news and opinion with a circulation of 200,000, to show its contrition.

Spokesman Tadashi Saito said the company will explain its action more fully at a news conference Thursday, to be held with officials of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the Los Angeles-based organization that led the criticism of the article.

The Marco Polo article says that “there are some major doubts regarding the ‘Holocaust’ and the massacre of Jews by the Nazis. There is no doubt that Jews went to horrible deaths, but . . . scant evidence that they were systematically killed in gas chambers.”