The Netherlands has issued a fresh European arrest warrant for a Dutch-born convicted Nazi war criminal living in Germany.

Klass-Carel Faber, 88, served as an SS officer and is high on the Simon Wiesenthal Centre’s list of Nazi criminals. Germany has refused to extradite him and he lives in Bavaria.

The Dutch public prosecutor's office said the warrant was a “preliminary step” and then a formal extradition request will be made to Germany.

This is the first time the Netherlands has issued a European arrest warrant for a war criminal.

Faber is believed to have murdered 20 Jews at the Westerbork concentration camp. He was convicted and sentenced to death in the Netherlands in 1947, and later had his sentence commuted to life imprisonment.

In 1952 he escaped to Germany, where he was granted citizenship under a Nazi law which gave citizenship to collaborators.

In August, Israeli Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman requested Germany reconsider Faber’s case after a petition, organised by Jerusalem lawyer David Schonberg, was signed by 150 Israeli lawyers, demanding he be brought to justice.

The German Justice Ministry has promised it will look at the case again.