To: [email protected]
Cc: [email protected]
Sent: Friday, September 20, 2002

Dear Mr. Fife:

Re: Ottawa may end effort to expel Nazis, September 20,2002

You article was attention grabbing but unfortunately misleading. Just from the title of the article you have assumed GUILT. Are you assuming ... or were you misinformed? Please consider the following issues:

  1. In not one of these 17 cases was there any evidence of war crime complicity.
  2. Using the term "Nazi" in the headline or "Nazi war criminal" in the body of the article is a blatant LIBELOUS statement.
  3. "The accused was just following orders" was not the case at all. These people were forcibly taken from their villages and homes via threat of death to them and/or their families.
  4. The court documents exonerate these individuals and actually show them as victims of the Nazi regime.
  5. Why are the alleged victims Eastern European (mainly Ukrainian, German or Volksdeutsche)?
  6. Why are there no Soviet war criminals being sought in light of the fact that the communist regime was responsible for almost 100 million deaths?
  7. What does the rise of anti-semitism have to do with war crime issues?
  8. Why did you only include the input of the Canadian Jewish Congress?
  9. Where is the justice in stripping a Canadian of his citizenship without first proving that the individual was indeed a war criminal?
  10. The presumption of guilt in the Immigration Department's approach contradicts a basic tenet of our legal system, i.e., presumed innocent until proven guilty.
  11. Your article misleads the reader into thinking that the people up for deportation have been convicted of Nazi war crimes.
  12. This type of conduct and accusation has legal consequences to all parties involved in this type of disinformation.

There are many facets to this entire debate. There are many aspects of this issue that you are obviously unaware of. Most Canadian taxpayers would categorize this as a debacle of justice. Many naturalized Canadians are viewing this with trepidation. They are starting to fear for their future since it appears that any lobby group can target another innocent group at any time in history as long as they have the ear of the government. Does a Canadian born individual have more rights than a naturalized one? Should immigrants fear coming to Canada for this reason?

I encourage you to read the decisions of these cases before writing any further on this issue. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions. I did leave a voice mail message at your offices today.

Cordially,

Jerry Grod