VIENNA (Reuters) -- An Austrian man who became separated from his mother 55 years ago during World War II has found her in Ukraine after a two-year search.
"I had not counted on finding her alive," Michael Brandstetter said after the reunion with his 82-year-old mother in Austria Wednesday.As a young prisoner of war in 1942, Brandstetter's mother was transported from Ukraine to Austria where she was forced to work in a Lower Austrian inn.
Brandstetter, 56, was split from his mother and younger sister when still a toddler.
"I was taken to hospital suffering from scarlet fever and diphtheria . . . and they then told her I was dead," he said.
The Austrian Red Cross tracing service found his mother as well as his sister in Ukraine last year. The reunited family will spend the next two weeks together before mother and sister return to Ukraine.