The United States and West Germany have agreed to cooperate in the extradition of non-German Nazi war criminals found to be residing illegally in the United States, U.S. Attorney General William French Smith has announced.
The joint effort came about as the result of an exchange of letters earlier this year between Smith and Juergen Schmude, Justice Minister of the West German Federal Republic. Smith asked Schmude if his government would consider requesting the extradition of identified war criminals such as Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Latvians and others of non-German origin who worked for the Nazis in occupied countries during World War II.
Schmude noted in his reply that while German jurisdiction normally does not extend to crimes committed beyond German borders, he agreed with Smith-that each case must be considered on its own merits and that special circumstances in a particular case could lead to a conclusion that the basis for an extradition request exists. Schmude asked for further evidence in specific cases under investigation by the Department of Justice.
FOUR CASES
Four cases have been heard or are pending in which the U.S. seeks to revoke the citizenship of alleged war criminals who gained admission to this country by concealing their Nazi past and were naturalized later. Conrad Schellong, alleged to have been a guard at the Dachau and Sachsenburg concentration camps, was tried in Chicago May 25-June 3. The judge has not yet announced a verdict.
Luidas Kairys, an alleged supervisor at the Treblinka forced labor camp, went on trial in Chicago on June 14. The trial is expected to end this week. Juosiz Kungys, a Lithuanian accused of leading a detail which slaughtered large numbers of Jews in Lithuania is scheduled to go on trial in August. A fourth trial has been postponed until October.
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.
