Israel had no official reaction Tuesday to the U.S. Justice Department’s ban on the entry of Austrian President Kurt Waldheim to the United States.
But Premier Yitzhak Shamir, who is visiting Paris, commented publicly there. He said, “The American Administration did the right thing” and he was “not surprised.”
The chairman of the Israel Bar Association, Yaacov Rubin, meanwhile urged the Justice Ministry to continue its investigation of Waldheim’s alleged Nazi activities during World War II.
Rubin was reacting to a statement by a Justice Ministry spokesperson Monday that the evidence collected so far on Waldheim’s Nazi past was insufficient to start legal proceedings or to officially prevent him from entering the country because Waldheim himself was not questioned by Israel.
Rubin said that if there was any evidence that Waldheim had been a member of a Nazi organization or had worked for the Nazis, the Justice Ministry had a duty to expose it and draw the necessary conclusions.
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