DATE=10/6/1999
TYPE=BACKGROUND REPORT
TITLE=ARGENTINA/NAZI COMMISSION PART TWO
NUMBER=5-44426
BYLINE=BILL RODGERS
DATELINE=RIO DE JANEIRO
CONTENT=
VOICED AT:
INTRO: An Argentine government commission investigating
Nazi activities in Argentina after World War Two says
there is still more work to be done -- even though its
two-year mandate is just about over. In this second of
two reports, V-O-A's Bill Rodgers tells us the
commission was unable to get access to all the
Argentine government documents it wanted.
TEXT: The Commission of Inquiry into Nazi Activities
in Argentina(EDS: Comision Para la Esclaracion de las
Actividades del Nazismo en Argentina, CEANA), is making
its findings public as it nears the end of its two-year
mandate. Formed in 1997, the Commission has succeeded
in tracking shipments of looted Nazi gold, determined
the number of war criminals that arrived in Argentina,
and found evidence of government complicity in helping
settle war criminals and Nazi collaborators in the
immediate post-World War Two period.
But the Commission, known by its Spanish acronym as
CEANA, says more needs to be done before the full
extent of post-war Nazi activities in Argentina can be
learned. CEANA coordinator Ignacio Klich tells V-O-A
the panel has barely scratched the surface in finding
out about post-war Nazi activities in Argentina.
/// KLICH ACT ///
The results we have presented now are the results
of two years of work. We cannot, however, call
it a final report -- it is a report of a stage,
one stage in which this commission functioned
under the mandate that it was given by the
president of the Argentine government. That
government ceases to be in office on the 10th of
December and it will be for the next government
to decide whether to heed the requests or
recommendations by members of CEANA's
international panel and advisory committee to
have CEANA continue under its present form or
whatever form they decide to give it.
/// END ACT ///
//Opt// Mr. Klitch says researchrs would like to do
more work in the archives of the former Yugoslavia --
given the large number of Nazi collaborators from
Croatia that found refuge in Argentina after the war.
//End Opt//
He says the commission also needs to examine Argentine
documents that were not available to researchers --
citing as an example papers from the former Argentine
War Ministry. Mr. Klitch said these documents, now
presumably kept by the Defense Ministry, were never
found. Also, he said requests to the government's
intelligence secretariat for documents pertaining to
the post-war period went unanswered.
Mr. Klich says he is not sure if there was a deliberate
attempt to keep information out of the commission's
hands.
/// KLICH ACT ///
We don't know, a priori, whether someone actually
is hiding these papers from our side to prevent
us from discovering something even bigger -- or
whether this is a case of, basically, so many
years have gone by and Argentina does not have
such a strong archivistic tradition as to have
archives organized....At this point, all I can
say it was difficult to gain access to these and
we wanted to see them.
/// END ACT ///
But commission researchers were able to look at
thousands of other documents, both in Argentina and
abroad. It was enough so that the commission was able
to reveal some previously unknown post-war Nazi
activities, including the arrival in Argentina of 200
kilograms of looted gold brought by members of
Croatia's pro-Nazi Ustasha government.
The work of the CEANA commission is unprecedented in
Argentina. There was a previous effort to investigate
Argentina's Nazi past in the 1950's following the
overthrow of President Juan Domingo Peron, but little
was revealed. Mr. Klich believes the commission's work
can be used as a model for other such investigations --
such as into the human rights violations committed
during the late 1970's by Argentina's military
dictatorships.
/// KLICH ACT ///
This is an unprecedented and in a certain way
unique self-introspective exercise -- one which
has elicited the support and the participation of
the best Argentine academic minds in Argentina
and elsewhere, because we've had in this project
participating Argentine experts from Argentina
and from abroad. So, one of the merits of this
commission is that it can serve as a precedent
for other self-introspective exercises that
Argentines are interested in -- whether it has to
do with something in 19th century history, or the
much more recent dirty war of 1976 to `83.
/// END ACT ///
The Commission plans to make its conclusions public in
the coming weeks, both abroad and in Argentina. The
full report also will be available on CEANA's internet
web site: www.ceana.org.arg. (Signed)
NEB/WFR/JP
06-Oct-1999 15:45 PM EDT (06-Oct-1999 1945 UTC)
NNNN
Source: Voice of America
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