West German authorities have detained Boleslavs Maikovskis, an ex-Nazi who was recently discovered having fled the United States while awaiting deportation.
Klaus Schacht, chief war crimes investigator for the West German state prosecutor’s office, said Maikovskis was arrested at his home in Munster because of fears he might try to flee West Germany.
Schacht said his office in Dortmund would appreciate assistance from the Soviet Union, but he did not say whether West Germany would deport Maikovskis to the Soviet Union.
There is currently no extradition treaty between West Germany and the Soviet Union.
The Soviets have reportedly offered West Germany all the necessary assistance.
According to the latest, unverified accounts, Maikovskis asked for West German asylum last November after fleeing the United States.
The United States ordered him deported in 1984 for acts perpetrated during World War II. He had lived here since 1951.
Maikovskis was sentenced to death in absentia in 1965 by a court in Riga, Latvia, for his wartime crimes, which included ordering the burning of the village of Audrini and the massacre of the population.
The Office of Special Investigations of the Justice Department had been trying to deport Maikovskis to the Soviet Union because its first choice, West Germany, had refused several requests to try Maikovskis there.
A spokesman for the OSI, which has been criticized by the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith for not having known Maikovskis’ whereabouts and for having allowed him to “vanish” from the United States, declared Maikovskis’ appearance in West Germany as “a victory for the OSI.
“We have sent Boleslavs Maikovskis to the country that we originally designated, a country that, unlike the United States, has criminal jurisdiction in such cases and which four years ago prosecuted Maikovskis’ immediate superior, Albert Eichelis.”
Maikovskis, 84, reportedly entered West Germany on a Latvian passport issued by the Latvian government in exile.
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