Judge orders release of records on Nazi war criminals who settled in Canada

Top Nazi leaders faced war crimes trials after the Second World War but many others who took part in the Holocaust went unpunished. The Canadian government is examining whether to release a list of 900 alleged Nazi war criminals that was compiled in 1986 by the Deschênes Commission. PHOTO COURTESY OF THE U.S. NATIONAL ARCHIVES (RECORD GROUP 238 / NAID 540127), PUBLIC DOMAIN

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A judge has ordered the release of federal records on an American initiative to settle Nazi war criminals in Canada after ruling there is no evidence that making the files public would harm relations between the two nations.

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The records involve a U.S. program set up after the Second World War to secretly settle large numbers of Nazi war criminals in Canada, often with the support of Canadian officials.

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Jewish advocacy group B’nai Brith Canada took the federal government to court after receiving a censored copy of a report written for the 1985 Deschênes Commission on Nazi war criminals. That study, called the Rodal Report, discussed a secret U.S. government program to resettle Nazis and Nazi collaborators in Canada by evading proper security screenings.

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The federal government declined to release the documents under the Access to Information law, claiming the records would harm U.S.-Canada relations at a time of ongoing tension.

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But Federal Court judge Simon Fothergill concluded that claim was unsupported by any evidence. “A bald statement of ongoing ‘tensions’ between Canada and the United States is not a sufficient basis to refuse disclosure of very specific information related to efforts by the United States to resettle suspected Nazis and Nazi collaborators in Canada following World War II,” he wrote in a Sept. 1 ruling.

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The decision to withhold the information was unreasonable and the records must now be disclosed, Fothergill concluded.

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Similar information had already been released years ago by the Central Intelligence Agency, which ran the Nazi resettlement program, as well as the U.S. government.

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After the war, U.S. intelligence agencies recruited Nazis and Nazi collaborators, many from eastern Europe, for their covert operations against the Soviet Union.

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Fothergill noted in his ruling that the study written for the Deschênes Commission concluded “inadequate security screening led to many perpetrators of Nazi war crimes entering Canada.” He also pointed out the study concluded Canada was reluctant to prosecute such war criminals.

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Richard Robertson, B’nai Brith’s director of advocacy, said it is difficult to understand why the Canadian government still continues to withhold its Nazi files. “For a country that fought against Nazi Germany, to be so hesitant to come with terms and release to the public its Nazi past so we can learn from this dark history, is perplexing to say the least,” he said.