Wednesday, 19 May 1999 16:12 (GMT)

(urgent) (UPI Spotlight) DOJ again moves against Demjanjuk WASHINGTON, May 19 (UPI) -

The Justice Department has asked a federal court in Cleveland (Wednesday) to revoke the citizenship of John Demjanjuk, alleging that he was a guard a Nazi concentration camps during World War II.

The department is making the allegations even though the Israeli Supreme Court found that there was reasonable doubt the 72-year-old retired autoworker was the infamous concentration guard known as "Ivan the Terrible."

Wednesday May 19 11:53 AM ET

U.S. Tries Again To Revoke Demjanjuk's Citizenship WASHINGTON (Reuters) - John Demjanjuk, convicted and then cleared of being the infamous Nazi death camp guard "Ivan the Terrible," faces a new lawsuit to strip him of his U.S. citizenship, the Justice Department said Wednesday.

The Justice Department, which was severely rebuked for how it initially handled Demjanjuk's case, announced that it would try again to take away the citizenship of the retired Cleveland autoworker, who is 79.

In the latest development in a more than 20-year legal battle, the lawsuit filed in federal court in Cleveland accused Demjanjuk of being a guard at the Sodibor extermination camp and at the Majdanek and Flossenburg concentration camps.

The Justice Department has suffered a number of embarrassing setbacks in the Demjanjuk case over the years.

In 1993, a U.S. appeals court ruled the department's Nazi-hunting lawyers in the late 1970s and early 1980s deliberately withheld evidence undermining their claim that Demjanjuk was "Ivan the Terrible" at the Treblinka death camp in Poland.

Demjanjuk, a Ukrainian immigrant, has denied having been a guard at any death camp and has insisted he has been a victim of mistaken identity. He was deported to Israel, where he spent five years on death row, before he was cleared in 1993 on the "Ivan" charges and returned to the United States

Wednesday May 19 1:01 PM ET

U.S. In New Bid To Revoke Demjanjuk's Citizenship

By James Vicini

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - John Demjanjuk, convicted and then cleared of being the notorious Nazi war criminal "Ivan the Terrible," faces a new lawsuit to strip him of his U.S. citizenship, the Justice Department announced Wednesday.

The Justice Department, which has been severely rebuked for how it initially handled Demjanjuk's case, said it would try again to take away the citizenship of the retired Cleveland autoworker, who is 79.

In the latest development in a more than 20-year legal battle, the lawsuit filed in federal court in Cleveland accused Demjanjuk of being a guard at the Sobibor extermination camp and at concentration camps in Poland and Germany.

It also alleged that he was a member of the SS-run Trawniki unit that participated in the Nazi campaign to annihilate Jews in Europe during the Second World War.

Demjanjuk, a Ukrainian immigrant, has denied having been a guard at any death camp and has insisted he has been a victim of mistaken identity.

Demjanjuk was extradited to Israel in 1986, where he was convicted of crimes against humanity and sentenced to death. But the Israeli Supreme Court cleared him in 1993 of being the gas chamber operator known as ``Ivan the Terrible'' at the Treblinka death camp in Poland, and he returned to the United States.

The Justice Department has suffered a number of embarrassing setbacks in the Demjanjuk case over the years.

In 1993, a U.S. appeals court ruled the department's Nazi-hunting lawyers in the late 1970s and early 1980s deliberately withheld evidence undermining their claim that Demjanjuk was "Ivan."

A federal judge in Cleveland last year reinstated Demjanjuk's U.S. citizenship, but said the Justice Department could file a new complaint if it believed the evidence against him warranted it.

The 15-page lawsuit alleged that Demjanjuk was an armed guard at the Sobibor death camp in Poland, where more than 200,000 Jewish civilians were killed in the gas chambers.

It alleged that Demjanjuk began working for the Nazis in 1942 at the Trawniki training camp in Nazi-occupied Poland that prepared East European recruits to assist the Germans in carrying out the Nazi's genocidal race policies.

The lawsuit accused Demjanjuk and others from Trawniki of participating in "Operation Reinhard," a program to exterminate Jews in Poland.

The lawsuit alleged Demjanjuk served as an armed guard at the Majdanek death camp in Lublin, Poland, where more than 200,000 Jews were killed, and at the Flossenburg concentration camp in southeastern Germany, near the Czech border. About 30,000 prisoners died there during the war.

It alleged Demjanjuk lied about his wartime activities, claiming he spent the war working on a farm in Poland and as a laborer in Germany, when he obtained a visa to enter the United States in 1952. He became a citizen six years later.

If the Justice Department succeeds in getting Demjanjuk's citizenship revoked, a process that could drag on for years, then it could move to bring separate deportation proceedings against him.