World Jewish Congress urges US government to deport former Nazi guard living in NY

NEW YORK - The World Jewish Congress, North America today called on the United States government to deport an accused Nazi war criminal living in New York City.
 
Jakiw Palij, 92, is alleged to have guarded the Trawinki death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland in 1943, where 6,000 Jews were murdered. He is the last accused Nazi concentration camp guard still known to be living in the United States.
 
US federal courts have concluded that Palij entered the United States illegally in 1949 after failing to disclose that he had worked at the Trawniki training camps for secret service troops who would carry out the extermination of Polish Jews. His deportation was ordered in 2004 but none of the three European countries to which he could be sent - Germany, Poland, and Ukraine - agreed to take him.
 
Evelyn Sommer, Chair, World Jewish Congress, North America, said, “It is nothing short of a travesty that a convicted Nazi war criminal who was ordered deported to either Germany, Poland or Ukraine, still resides peacefully and in freedom in the United States.
 
“Jakiw Palij, who was called an essential component in the evil machinery of annihilation by the Justice Department, was a guard at a death camp in Poland and should pay the price for his crimes.  We urge the US State Department to take all necessary steps to have one of these countries agree to take Palij so that he can be deported and true justice can be served.”