Stephen Bindman Vancouver Sun 26-Jan-1998 Corrupters, and not facilitators, of justice

Stephen Bindman Vancouver Sun 26-Jan-1998 Corrupters, and not facilitators, of justice

U.S. Nazi-hunter ignites Canadian controversy
[photo of Neal Sher not shown; caption reads "Neal Sher: Hiring debated."]

Jewish and Ukrainian groups are trading accusations over the appointment of Neal Sher, the former head of an investigations unit considered unscrupulous by some and a scapegoat by others.

STEPHEN BINDMAN
SOUTHAM NEWSPAPERS

OTTAWA - The federal government�s recent hiring of a top American Nazi hunter has re-ignited long-simmering tensions between Canada�s Jewish and Ukrainian communities over the pursuit of suspected war criminals.

Leaders of the two communities have been trading increasingly nasty shots in newspaper letters to the editor since the appointment last month of Neal Sher, former head of the United States Office of Special Investigations (OSI), as an adviser to Canada�s war crimes unit.

Several Ukrainian groups say Ottawa shouldn�t have gone anywhere near Sher because the OSI�s "unscrupulous" tactics in pursuit of suspected Nazi war criminals in the U.S. have been "discredited."

"With the arrival of Neal Sher, well, Senator Joseph McCarthy move over," says Eugene Harasymiw, president of the Alberta Ukrainian Self-Reliance League, the lay organization of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. "There is indeed much to learn from the American experience, provided we as Canadians recognize the OSI and Neal Sher for what they really are - corrupters, and not facilitators, of justice.

"Mr. Sher is not fit to work within the Canadian justice system, period."

But Jewish leaders say Sher is being used as a convenient scapegoat to discredit Canada�s entire war crimes program, which for the first time since the end of the Second World War is picking up steam - and targetting some members of the Ukrainian community.

"For the most part, since very little has happened in Canada, it�s not been until recently that the Ukrainians had any reason to concern themselves with the possibility of deportation or denaturalizations," said Irving Abella, of the Canadian Jewish Congress.

Between 1983 and 1994, Sher headed the American Nazi-hunting unit, which has investigated thousands of suspected collaborators and won court orders stripping 60 of their U.S. citizenship.

At the heart of the Ukrainians� grievance is the OSI�s handling of the case of John Demjanjuk, a Ukrainian who was extradited to Israel in 1986 but later acquitted by the Israeli Supreme Court of being notorious concentration camp guard "Ivan the Terrible."

A U.S. appeals court later excoriated OSI lawyers for "acting with reckless disregard for the truth" by withholding several documents that could have helped Demjanjuk defend himself, in part to curry favour with Jewish organizations and because of a "win-at-any cost" attitude.

Canada�s Ukrainian community was actively involved in raising funds for the defense of Demjanjuk.

"Sher was sitting there for 12 years knowing full well what was going on with Demjanjuk," said Harasymiw.

"He sent an innocent man to the gallows. "They smeared my people saying the worst ogre of the 20th century was this Ivan the Terrible and he was a Ukrainian. Well, guess what, he wasn�t John Demjanjuk at all."

In a letter to the editor, another Ukrainian leader asked why the federal government was unable to locate "a Canadian lawyer of Jewish faith," instead of looking to Sher, who is Jewish.

The Ukrainian organizations have also used the Sher appointment to renew their long-standing opposition to Canada�s three-year-old- strategy to strip suspected Nazi collaborators of their citizenship and deport them, rather than try them in Canada.

The federal government abandoned criminal prosecutions after a 1994 ruling by the Supreme Court of Canada allowed suspects to defend themselves by claiming they were only following orders and adopted the American approach of denaturalization and deportation.

Since 1995, Ottawa has begun court proceedings against 14 suspected collaborators accused of lying about their activities during the Second World War when they entered Canada and later obtained citizenship.

Three of the suspects have died, one has left voluntarily and trials are finally beginning for many of the others.

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