‘Nazi past’ may cost US citizen dearly

The US government has asked a court to revoke the citizenship of an 86-year-old man accused of serving in the Ukrainian Auxiliary Police during the second world war.

Investigation of Nazi crimes has grown ever more sophisticated

Officials at the district attorney’s office on Wednesday said Michael Bojcun joined the police force in his early twenties shortly after Nazi Germany occupied the city of Lviv in western Ukraine.

 

He served for three years until Hitler’s troops were forced to retreat from Ukraine in July 1944. Bojcun entered the United States from Germany in 1949 and became a citizen in 1960.

 

On Wednesday, the US Department of Justice asked a federal court in New Jersey, where Bojcun lives, to cancel his passport.

 

According to the complaint, Bojcun served in the Ukrainian Auxiliary Police (UAP) when it helped the Nazis carry out repressive measures against the city’s Jews, leading to their confinement and ultimate murder.

 

Time doesn’t mitigate

 

Later UAP members forcibly relocated the city’s Jews to an enclosed ghetto, where thousands died from disease, starvation or abuse, according to the justice department.

 

“The passage of time does not mitigate Bocjun’s contribution to the Holocaust,” US attorney Christopher Christie said.

 

“Even decades later, Nazi collaborators cannot be allowed to continue to hide amongst us in the United States.”

  

The government says his US citizenship should be revoked because his wartime assistance in persecution made him ineligible for citizenship and because he concealed his UAP service when he applied for a visa.

Source: AFP