U.S. JEWS ASK PAPAL INQUIRY INTO REPORT OF AID TO NAZIS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-01208R000100120079-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 25, 2011
• Sequence Number: 79
• Publication Date: January 27, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/02/25: CIA-RDP90-01208R000100120079-4
ON PAGE
NEW YORK TINS
27 January 1984
U. U.S. Jews Ask Papal Inquiry
Into Reports of Aid to Nazis
-----------------
BY RALPH BLUMENTHAL.
rrominent American Jews, reacting
to allegations of Vatican aid for fugi-
tive Nazi war criminals, called on pope
John Paul II yesterday to investigate
"what role if any was played by mem-
bers of the Catholic hierarchy in the
illegal emigration of Nazis following
World War IL"
The request came in a telegram sent
to the Pope by the Conference of Presi-
d
s
ent
of Major American Jewish Or_
ganizations, a New York group repre-
senting 37 organizations. The telegram
was signed by : he group's chairman,
. Julius Berman.
The presidents of the Jewish groups
termed themselves "deeply disturbed
by the report of cooperation by the Holy
See with the effort of Nazi war crimi-
nals to escape justice." They called on
the Pope to order the same kind of in-
vestigation as the one carried.out by
the Justice Department last year in the
case of American involvement with
Klaus Barbie, who was the bead of the
Gestapo in Lyons in World War II.
There was no immediate comment
from the Vatican, which may not yet
have received the appeal. A papal
spokesman, the Rev. Romeo Panciroli,
said Wednesday in Rome that be would
respond only to written inquiries and
would need several days to check the
archives.
Telegram to Chilean President
In another appeal yesterday, the
Anti-Defamation League of B'nai
B'rith sent a telegram to the President
of Chile, Gen. Augusto Pinochet, urg-
ing the detention of Walter Rauff, a for-
mer SS colonel wanted for wartime
killings of as many as 250,000 Jews in
mobile poison gas vans.
..The reputation of Chile will be
sorely blemished if your administra-
tion does not agree to extradite this
Nazi criminal or otherwise make him 1
available to the officials of Israel or
any other country that will try him for
his crimes against humanity,' said the
telegram, which was signed by Abra-
ham H. Foxman, associate national di-
rector of the Jewish group.
The New York Times reported yes-
terday that Mr. Rauff told the Chilean
Supreme Court in 1962 that be had been
given refuge in Vatican convents after.'
thawar. ThP TimPC alcn rpmrraf that a
long-secret State Department report in
1947 called the Vatican "the largest sin-
gle organization involved in the illegal 1
Nazismovement - of emigrants," including,'
Nazis.
Committee Hearings
The State Department report was
written by Vincent La Vista, a member
of the American. Embassy in Rome, to
another Foreign Service officer, Her-
bert writer Cgo R. Allen on the
tamed the said that his research
m cat t ista_ may have
worked for the rued t nt- e
enter-tntel_l,wFa.rs+ rl,*.,,~ ~? .,,,,. ~_
had found no documentation to cor. I
I
In another development a member i
of the House immj rar.n. sub
tee, Representative Barney Frank
Democrat of
MassactrtLSetts said
Y the expected the full Judici_
es s
Spring .on -Amen n rntP
..lam..
Xolement with Nazi war criminals.:
The Genera ~ t:og Office has
been studying the matter for Congress
for about two years.
A spokesman for Representative
Peter W. Rodino Jr., Democrat of New .
Jersey, the chairman of the Judiciary:
Committee, said no decision had been
reached yet on hearings.
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/02/25: CIA-RDP90-01208R000100120079-4