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Nazi era collaborators stripped of citizenship
May 25, 2007 - 3:08am
Canada strips citizenship from Nazis
And as for my passion, I credit my dear parents whose committment to social justice knew no bounds.
http://www.justice.gc.ca/en/ps/wc/dr-rd.html
It is interesting how short this list is. There is not one mention of Southern/central American countries such as the Pinochet, Somoza, Batista, regimes etc. Is this a question of funding? A question of the respective communities having no clear voice in Canadian society? Canada needs to have a strong neutral voice that can observe and take in complaints regardless of how large or vocal a community is within Canada and regardless of how much "media" attention a conflict received. Canada must also be able to include Canadian personnel and citizens in a separate section (outside of the immigration act) for obvious reasons. The "Complicity" definition below brings Canadian military and police training of the Haitian National Police and support of the Interim Government's campaign against Lavalas into question as training personnel do not have to be directly involved in the crime but simply aware of and have knowledge of its occurrence.
Department of Justice definitions for the purpose of the war crimes program. (WW2 has a separate section.)
Crimes against Humanity --
Includes crimes such as murder, extermination, enslavement, torture and any other inhumane act committed against civilians, in a widespread or systematic manner, whether or not the country is in a state of war, and regardless if the act is in violation of the territorial law in force at the time. The acts may have been committed by state officials or private individuals, and against their own nationals or nationals of other states.
Genocide
The deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, whether committed in times of peace or in times of war, by state officials or private individuals.
War Crimes
Criminal acts committed during international armed conflicts (war between states) and civil wars, which violate the rules of war as defined by international law. These acts include the ill-treatment of civilian populations within occupied territories, the violation and exploitation of individuals and private property, and the torture and execution of prisoners.
Complicity
Active membership in the organization responsible for committing proscribed atrocities is not required. Generally, a person can be considered "complicit" if, while aware of the acts committed, the person contributes, directly or indirectly, to their occurrence. Membership in an organization responsible for committing the atrocities can be sufficient to establish complicity if the organization in question is one with a limited brutal purpose, such as a death squad.
ETA: The feds should have put student loans collection agencies on the case instead of the RCMP. They'd have fled Canada voluntarily.
[ 25 May 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]
Ha! [img]biggrin.gif" border="0[/img] You are SO right!
All those who brought fascism to power then, and all those who seek to return it to power today, must be held accountable.
They also failed stopping Hitler in the mid-30s by ignoring the pleas of those fighing the fascist Franco. These crimes have never been accounted for.
Right you are, but whataya think about 'Nazi era collaborators stripped of citizenship?'
Justice was delayed for too long. I believe that it's important for survivors of the Holocaust as well as the rest of humanity for all war criminals to admit their wrong doing in a world court of law. Western world have been hypocritical in treatment of war criminals and friendly dictators who have committed crimes against humanity. Thousands have been harbored and protected from international law.
I think imprisonment and punishment would be somewhat meaningless at this point. It's an admittal of guilt to the world that's most important. I've read the thoughts of some Nazi war criminals on what happened, and some of them still refuse to admit they did anything wrong. I think fascism can be a state of mind, and it thrives stronger than ever before. Observe Canadian Ralph Klein's college essay defending General Pinochet's fascist record in Chile. Observe the barbarism in Iraq and Afghanistan today, and NATO's carpet bombing of Yugoslavia at the end of the last decade.
The next generations must be vigilant not to be lulled into a false sense of security with token gestures such as this, feigning a sense of law and order and that all is right after oceans of time have passed. Such gestures were few and far between during the cold war. The Russians and Israelis pointed out war criminals living in our midst to Canadian and U.S. governments in the recent past only to be ignored and stonewalled. There is still the issue of justice denied in Latin America with several "friendly" cold war era dictators and dreadful School of the Americas graduates allowed to roam freely without fear of justice. Capitalism is fascism with the mask on. When status quo is threatened by true democracy, the mask will come off once again.
Recurring fascism is evidence that the world does not operate well on a monetary basis, imo. "Capitalism is a car constantly on blocks." I forget which babbler said that several months ago, but it's true. And I believe yet another crisis of capitalism is in the making and will culiminate in chaos and war as per history.
[ 25 May 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]
I had to cynically laugh when I read this in the article:
For f8698s sakes, it took almost 60 years to finally do something about these two--long after they were identified as Nazi collaborators in the Holocaust!
This country is crawling with all kinds of violent criminals and terrorists who seem to sneak under the radar because of their "appropriate" political connections and agendas that happen to compliment the ruling cliques here.
I also largely agree with Andrew Telegdi's concerns that the cabinet should not be making arbitrary decisions about revoking anyone's citizenship or otherwise directly punishing people. That should be the courts' jobs.
But in this case, it's clear the two in question have long since been identified as Nazi stooges living here in violation of the law and international treaties. They should have been dealt with years ago.
Kitchener Waterloo Record
(In passing, that sounds like the same excuses they made for the pope. "Oh, he was YOUNG. He was forced into it! I'm sure he didn't MEAN it! He's been a model citizen ever since!" Whatever.)
So, you were in Kitchener-Waterloo while this was all happening, huh?
Why was his citizenship restored by the Federal Court of Appeal, and why and how did "the government" revoke it now?
I personally believe Canada should be harshly punishing war criminals - not just deporting them and washing its hands. But I also believe in the rule of law.
Anyone know what really happened here?
If that's the case, then this is one case where I think the court is wrong. If he was in the unit, he was part of the killing. I don't know for sure, but it seems to me that they didn't just recruit people off the street to go join the Einsatzgruppen or Einsatzkommando or whatever. Didn't you have to prove yourself first?
It was picayune at best but I have to figure that this time the government will get it right.
And hey Ohara, St Jacobs is a beautiful place. Where were you staying? Did you get some of that great apple pie in the St Jacobs market?
Petsy, yes yes yes, one of my favourite bakeries is the Strone Crock Bakery here in St. J's. And yes I love their Dutch Apple Pie Mmmmmmmmmmm
Let's hope the bureaucrats got it right this time.
So, it means that people who shouldn't be deported wind up with deportation orders because the bureaucrats don't take into account all the evidence they should that the person is not a risk (I have personal experience of that one with a case I was involved with!), or they get sloppy and refuse to do the proper research and paperwork to make a case where someone SHOULD be deported, and which should be open and shut, airtight.
[ 28 May 2007: Message edited by: Michelle ]
The thing is though, that isn't guilty of war crime because he was a translator. Being a translator obviously isn't a crime.
Where the criminal charge has merit is the fact that he had direct knowledge of murder and atrocity not considered part of a "legitimate" war effort and withheld that information (sickeningly, most murders and atrocities are considered legal in a war).
That, whether by Nuremburg rules, or by criminal law in most countries makes him what's known as an Accessory After the Fact .
Ok, so it may be true he was young at the time and was ordered to act as a translator in the rounding up and killing of innocent people--obviously under pain of likely death if he refused.
But after the war, when the Nazi regime had been defeated, he had information directly relating to the crimes and did not disclose it. That alone is enough, in most countries, to land him in prison for several years.
Had he come forward, he could have gotten off Scott free, or served a minimum sentence and got on with his life.
Instead he chose to keep it a secret, until he was found out. He hasn't got much of a defense that I can see. He is, by virtue of this fact, a collaborator.
[ 30 May 2007: Message edited by: Fidel ]
And I don't know about Fast, but Oberlander was far more than a mere cook. He was a translator, which sounds innocent enough if you don't realize what those translators were actually translating. From what I understand, they were asking the locals in occupied areas of eastern Europe and the USSR who the Jews were in town, and interpreting this information for the stormtroopers so the latter could do their job. If that's not complicity in the Holocaust, I don't know what is.
Incidentally, a lot of folks in the city formerly known as Berlin were unsettlingly sympathetic to Oberlander. I guess we should give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they didn't know what he actually did.
[ 30 May 2007: Message edited by: Agent 204 ]