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Mitterrand Hiding Vichy
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Paris (JTA) — Nazi-hunter
Serge Klarsfeld has accused
President Francois Mitter-
rand of protecting a former
Vichy official in order to
conceal his own service to
the Vichy regime.
The stunning charge was
made in an interview in Ac-
tualite Juive, a Jewish week-
ly which quoted Mr.
Klarsfeld as saying the pres-
ident "wants to avoid a close
study of his own activities in
Vichy, where he started his
political career," and was
therefore protecting Rene
Bousquet, former head of the
Vichy government's police.
Mr. Bousquet, 81, has been
ordered to stand trial for
crimes against humanity
based on evidence unearthed
by Mr. Klarsfeld and his as-
sociates.
The Paris lawyer who
helped track down Nazi war
criminal Klaus Barbie is the
first prominent French Jew
to question Mr. Mitterrand's
wartime past. Mr. Mitter-
rand, a Socialist, joined the
French Resistance in 1942,
as Mr. Klarsfeld acknowl-
edged in the interview. But
before that, he worked for
the Veterans Administra-
tion run by the Vichy
regime, Mr. Klarsfeld said.
According to Mr.
Klarsfeld, Mr. Mitterrand is
deliberately protecting Mr.
Bousquet to prevent "too
close scrutiny" of the Vichy
administration, its officials
and policies.
The Vichy government,
headed by Marshall Henri
Petain, who was prime min-
ister, collaborated fully with
the Nazis. It was the Vichy
police, in fact, which round-
ed up tens of thousands of
French and foreign Jews for
deportation to death camps.
Jewish leaders refused to
react officially to Mr.
Klarsfeld's charge. But pri-
vately they said they were
deeply disturbed and feared
that "this sort of talk" could
drive a wedge between the
Jewish community and the
president.
Mr. Mitterrand has a
longstanding reputation of
friendship with the Jewish
community. But earlier this
year, he publicly condemned
"irresponsible elements" in
the Jewish community who
accused him of being an ac-
complice of Palestine Lib-
eration Organization leader
Yassir Arafat during
Arafat's visit to France.
Mr. Bousquet was tried by
a special tribunal in 1949 for
collaboration with the
enemy and was given a sym-
bolic sentence which was
promptly suspended.
Subsequently, he enjoyed a
long remunerative career as
a banker and headed several
large corporations until he
retired five years ago, when
Mr. Klarsfeld brought new
charges against him.
Mr. Klarsfeld and an
organization of children of
Jewish deportees have pro-
duced new documentary
evidence that Mr. Bousquet
ordered the Vichy police to
arrest Jews.
The prosecution originally
asked for trial by a special
tribunal which has been
long dormant and could take
years to reconstitute.
But the Court of Appeals,
France's second-highest
jurisdiction, rejected that
request last month and or-
dered Mr. Bousquet tried by
a regular criminal court.
HIAS Activities
Scale Down
New York (JTA) — A year-
old change in U.S. immigra-
tion policies for Soviet ap-
plicants has changed the
operations of the Hebrew
Immigrant Aid Society, the
migration agency of the
American Jewish commu-
nity.
The New York-based
organization, which coor-
dinated the immigration of
Soviet Jews via Vienna and
Rome for the last two
decades, has scaled down its
activities in Europe and in-
itiated contact with poten-
tial emigrants within the
Soviet Union.
For the first time, a pair of
BIAS representatives twice
traveled to the Soviet Union
last year for two-week
rounds of meetings with (
Soviet Jewish community
leaders. A similar mission is
planned this month.
"We want to bring a little
clarity to lives that are filled
with uncertainty," says
Deborah Mark, special assis-
tant to the executive vice
president of HIAS. "The
Russian Jews are begging us
for information."
"There is a feeling 'We
can't stay here,' " said Mer-
rill Rosenberg, director of
the BIAS Italian office, re-
ferring to the growing threat
of anti-Semitism in the
Soviet Union and the
breakdown of the country's
economy.