U.S. Supreme Court Orders Extradition Hearings for Yugoslav Nazi

The Supreme Court today ordered an extradition hearing for Andrija Artukovic, Yugoslavian Nazi collaborator, to determine if he should be deported to Yugoslavia to face trials for responsibility in the murder of many thousands of Jews and other people. The Supreme Court vote was seven to two.

Artukovic, as Minister of Interior of the Nazi puppet state of Croatia, implemented the Hitler extermination program to the degree that he was listed as a war criminal. After World War II, he was found to have escaped and had taken up residence in California. He won a ruling in that state against deportation on the grounds that his crimes were political and therefore not extraditable under the treaty.

Yugoslavia appealed for a review by the Supreme Court. Today’s ruling indicates acceptance of a Justice Department suggestion that Artukovic be given a new hearing before a United States Commissioner in California. The court directed that Artukovic be put in the immediate custody of a U.S. marshal pending a new hearing.

The State Department had told the Supreme Court that a new hearing was necessary “since on the basis of the matters thus far adduced, the Department of State ‘cannot reach the conclusion that all of the acts alleged by the Yugoslav Government to have been committed by Artukovic are necessarily of a political character, as the words ‘political character’ are used in Article Four of the extradition treaty in effect between the U.S. and Yugoslavia.'”

The State Department said the hearing could produce evidence that would establish whether the crimes charged were actually all of a political character or of a criminal nature.