The Irish government announced today that it will bar Pieter Menten, a Nazi war criminal, from returning to the Irish Republic after his release tomorrow from a Dutch prison.
Menten, 85, was sentenced to a 10-year prison term by a Dutch court for massacring thousands of Polish Jews in Podhoroze, in what is now Soviet Ukraine. Menten owns a home in the Waterford village of Lembybrian and his Dutch attorneys have said he intends to leave Holland for Ireland immediately after his release.
An Irish official spokesman said the decision to bar Menten, a Dutch national, from returning was taken today by the Irish government which met under the Presidency of Premier Garrett FitzGerald in Dublin. The government was convened for a special session after spokesmen for the local Jewish community protested against Menten’s possible return. Dr. Joseph Briscoe, a local Jewish leader, said not only Jews “but all the Irish people are opposed to Menten’s return to Ireland.”
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
