Bermuda is home to a $30 million fund voluntarily set up by insurers for the international commission working on resolving Holocaust survivors' unpaid insurance claims, it was revealed yesterday.

The insurance companies have been asked to pay a further $60 million into the Bermuda trust formed in 1998 but are baulking at this. They say they have already paid more than the original $30 million and they complain that the commission -- the International Commission on Holocaust Era Insurance Claims (ICHEIC) -- is spending too much.

The insurance companies involved are Allianz of Germany, Axa of France, Generali of Italy, Winterthur and Zurich of Switzerland. All five companies have objected to the request for more money. One company estimated that the companies had already provided more than $34 million for the commission's expenses, over and above the $30 million lodged in the Bermuda trust.

Lawrence Eagleburger, the commission chairman and former US secretary of state, said the companies had made a good faith commitment to contribute $90 million in all.

The question of financing the commission will be an important issue at its meeting which began yesterday in Washington. Mr Eagleburger has already distributed the insurance companies' responses to the request for more money to all commission members. He has also told members he is "no longer prepared to face financing questions from month to month''.

The ICHEIC was established in October 1998 by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners in cooperation with several European insurance companies, European regulators, representatives of several Jewish organisations and the state of Israel.

The commission is charged with establishing a just process that will expiditiously address the issue of unpaid insurance policies issued to victims of the Holocaust. It has set up a claims resolution process to handle insurance claims of Holocaust victims, survivors and their heirs and beneficiaries.

Claimants under the scheme can obtain a claims package detailing how to file a claim from the commission and must submit it by January 31 2002. Standards of proof have been agreed by which the participating insurance companies will assess the validity of claims.

Valuation guidelines have also been agreed by the insurance companies for making offers on valid claims. These take account of a wide range of historic and economic factors affecting Europe in the pre and post war periods. The basic intention is to give a present day value to dormant Holocaust era insurance policies.

ICHEIC has posted lists of policyholders from the Holocaust era on its website, which potential claimants are asked to check. The lists have been compiled from several sources including public archives and insurance company members of the commission.

The lists may not include all potential claims and potential claimants are advised to file claims even if their families do not appear on the lists. But a name on the list does not automatically entitle an individual to payment. It may turn out that the claim was previously settled, was paid to beneficiaries or the insured, that loans were taken out against the policy or the claim was settled through a post war government restitution programme.