B’NAI BRITH CANADA WANTS GOVERNMENT TO DEMAND ANSWERS ON WALLENBERG

“Greater access needed to KGB files”

Toronto, January 14, 2003

For Immediate Release

Toronto, January 14, 2002… As plans unfold for commemorating Raoul Wallenberg Day on January 17^th, B’nai Brith Canada has renewed its calls to the government to press Russia for full disclosure of all information relevant to his fate.

David Matas, Senior Legal Counsel for B’nai Brith Canada, the foremost expert on Wallenberg in Canada today, has done extensive research on Wallenberg, which included travel to Russia and Sweden to examine key archives. He has long requested that Canada negotiate a Memorandum of Understanding with Russia to allow direct Canadian access to archives, firsthand Canadian efforts to locate Russian witnesses and face-to-face interviewing of Russian witnesses. Canada has negotiated this type of Memorandum before in order to carry out the research necessary for war crimes prosecutions.

Rochelle Wilner, National President, stated: “Wallenberg is Canada’s only honourary citizen and thus this country has a special responsibility to him. Having a Raoul Wallenberg Day is a marvelous gesture, but that alone does not mean that we have fulfilled our collective debt to him for his outstanding heroism. What Wallenberg stands for is just as relevant today as it was during World War II and there is no justification for Canada to relax its efforts in this area.”

Frank Dimant, Executive Vice President, stated: “We should not accept that the fate of Raoul Wallenberg must remain an unsolved mystery. Canadian officials should meet with senior representatives of the Procurator General of Russia, the Main Archival Administration and the Department of State Security (KGB) in order to ensure that this investigation is kept alive.”

David Matas outlined the roadblocks he has encountered in his quest for answers on Wallenberg: “Many requests for information from Russian archivists go unanswered and those that are answered contain limited information. The time lag between a request and a response is at least several months and can be years. There is no way of evaluating the thoroughness of the methodology used by the Russian authorities in identifying and tracing witnesses or locating relevant historical documentation. We must develop a new strategy and to do so we need greater access to KGB investigative files.”

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For further comment contact David Matas at (204) 944-1831 or Ruth Klein at (416) 346-0114

B’nai Brith has been active in Canada since 1875 as the community’s foremost advocacy and volunteer organization.