Deutsche Zeitung in Norwegen (English: German Newspaper in Norway) was an Oslo-based daily newspaper published in Norway during the Second World War. It was published by the subsidiary Europa-Verlag of the Nazi-controlled Franz Eher Nachfolger,[1] and had a circulation of about 40,000 copies.[2] The paper served as a model for the Amsterdam-based Deutsche Zeitung in den Niederlanden.[3]
An appreciable difference between Deutsche Zeitung in Norwegen and Deutsche Zeitung in den Niederlanden was their divergent readership; the former was predominantly read by German soldiers in Norway,[4] whilst the latter chiefly had a civilian readership.[3] A competing newspaper in Norway was the Wacht im Norden, that was distributed free of charge to soldiers.[5] Towards the end of 1940, it was decided to establish an offshoot of the paper in Tromsø. Due to a lack of competent editors from Germany, the Tromsø paper was not established before February 1941.[6] It was withal merged with Lappland-Kurier upon Finland's truce with the Soviet Union in September 1944.[7]
According to publisher Max Amann, the editors of Deutsche Zeitung in Norwegen enjoyed more editorial freedom than the editors of newspapers in Nazi Germany. Oron Hale writes, however, that on a closer examination, the dissimilarities between the Norwegian paper and the German ones were small.[8] Until June 1940, the Deutsche Zeitung in Norwegen was subject of military censorship by the German propaganda department in Norway.[9] The newspaper and its offshoots were discontinued on the cease-fire in Europe on 8 May 1945.[10]