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Real History and European Democracy in Action The Index to the Traditional Enemies of Free Speech Alphabetical index (text) France Opens Judicial Inquiry into Holocaust Doubter By REUTERS PARIS (Reuters) – French prosecutors said Monday they were opening a judicial investigation into comments by a leading far-right politician who questioned whether the Nazis used gas chambers in the Holocaust.
Justice Minister Dominique Perben called for the inquiry after Bruno Gollnisch , a professor of Japanese at the University of Lyon, questioned how the gas chambers were used in the wartime slaughter of Jews and how many Jews were killed. Prosecutors in the southern city of Lyon said the investigation would focus on “denying crimes against humanity.” France anti-racism laws have made denying the Holocaust a crime, punishable by fines and even prison.
Prosecutors last month had already opened a preliminary investigation into the comments by Gollnisch, a European deputy who is also the number two man in the National Front party of extreme-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen . Gollnisch told a news conference last month he recognized gas chambers had existed but said he thought historians still had to decide whether they were actually used to kill Jews.
He called for an open debate about whether the total number of Jews killed in the Holocaust was actually 6 million as stated. The CRIF umbrella group of French Jewish organizations has publicly condemned Gollnisch’s comments, and European Parliament head Josep Borrell said the European assembly would not tolerate such a statement .
Gollnisch, who studied law and political science at Kyoto University in Japan, holds a chair for Japanese language and civilisation at the Lyon university named after Jean Moulin — the hero of the French Resistance murdered by the Nazis in 1943. The above item is reproduced without editing other than typographical Register your name and address to go on the Mailing List to receive or to hear when and where he will next speak near you 2004