Argentine President Carlos Menem has told a group of Jewish leaders that the country will establish a special agency to track down Nazis who found refuge there after World War II.
Ruben Beraja, president of the DAIA, the umbrella body of Argentine Jewish groups, and Manuel Tenenbaum, head of the Latin American Jewish Congress, met with Menem and his staff Thursday to discuss such a plan after police arrested former SS Captain Nazi Erich Priebke in an Andean resort town Tuesday.
Priebke was found in San Carlos de Bariloche, a haven for Nazis, and interviewed there by ABC Television for its program “PrimeTime Live,” which was broadcast last week.
Priebke admitted in the interview to having taken part in the reprisal massacre of 335 Romans at the Ardeatine Caves in March 1944. Since that broadcast, Italy initiated extradition proceedings for Priebke.
Elan Steinberg, executive director of the World Jewish Congress in New York, said Menem pledged to extradite Priebke as soon as the appropriate documentation is received from Italy.
Menem also agreed, according to Steinberg, to set up a center that will not only look at the files on Nazis who found refuge in Argentina but use the files to track down other Nazis who may be alive in Argentina.
The government’s files on Nazis were closed to the public until Menem opened them for the first time in 1992.
Even with the files opened, however, “there was no active effort to seek out those who were alive in Argentina and seek to bring them to justice,” Steinberg said.
The new agency will reportedly become part of either the foreign or interior ministries.
Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean of the Wiesenthal Center, said, “We are very delighted that the government of President Menem is acting so responsibly in this manner, and we also commend the government for the house arrest of Priebke, pending the completion of the extradition request.”
He added, “We also hope that this would signal that the government will respond to the list of eight suspected Nazi war criminals that we sent to the foreign minister last year, of which we have still not heard.”
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