Fourth Time Unlucky

"In fact they do not have a deportation order yet and cannot get one. He is protected by Canadian domicile. In addition, he has no country of nationality. He lost his German citizenship in 1960. He is stateless."
"Mr. Oberlander won at the appeal level three times. The law was, and is, in his favour. They then changed the law to deny him a right of appeal so that politics and not law, would prevail. They have been successful."
"It is a sad day for the rule of law and democracy in Canada."
Ronald Poulton, Oberlander lawyer

"[The federal government is pleased with the decision and remains] determined to deny safe haven in Canada to war criminals and persons believed to have committed or been complicit in war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide."
"While we do not take citizenship revocation lightly, we recognize that it is necessary in cases of fraud, false representation or where the individual knowingly concealed material circumstances."
Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship statement

United States Holocaust Museum

"Now, Mr. Oberlander has been unjustly persecuted for 24 years by the Government of Canada. Mr. Oberlander has never been charged with any crime. The Government of Canada has never produced a shred of evidence against Mr. Oberlander."
"No such evidence exists because he has never directly or indirectly contributed to any crime."
"Mr. Oberlander was innocent on the day this case began in 1995, and he is still innocent 24 years later."
Oberlander family statement

Dawid Samoszul, killed in the Treblinka killing center at the age of 9.

Helmut Oberlander surrendered to American forces, was held in a British prisoner of war camp in 1945, released to work as a farm labourer, and given a certificate of discharge from the German army. He lived in West Germany, at Hannover, then moved near Stuttgart to Korntal, reunited with his family, married in 1950 and emigrated from there with his wife to Canada in 1954, gaining citizenship in 1960.

To be perfectly clear, this man would never have been permitted entry to Canada had he divulged his status during the war, as a German conscript, working as a translator with one of Nazi Germany's dreaded Einsatzgrups, special police task fores operating in occupied territories of eastern Europe. These Einsatzgruppen had a very special role as mechanical killing machines, dispatched for the sole purpose of killing Jews, Roma, Communists, Soviets, Gays, Political dissenters and the disabled.

Soldiers from unidentified units of Einsatzgruppe C look through the possessions of Jews massacred at Babi Yar, a ravine near Kiev. Soviet Union, September 29–October 1, 1941. US Holocaust Memorial Museum

Mr. Oberlander is an ethnic German who at the time resided in the Soviet Union, currently Ukraine. He spoke German, Russian and Ukrainian. As a teenager of 17 he was ordered by local authorities to report to German forces and there his language proficiency landed him work as a translator for Einsatz-kommando 10a (Ek10a), a very special police task force meant to expedite what Nazi Germany thought of as the trash of humanity to their maker.

If prisoners taken by German troops in eastern Europe could not understand orders given them in German, Mr. Oberlander would translate helpfully so men, women and children would understand where they were to stand beside open pits after having been ordered to disrobe, so that when they were summarily shot they would fall neatly into the mass graves, and everything would be nice and tidy, and the unit's assignment satisfactorily carried out to perfection.

Helmut Oberlander failed to disclose to Canadian immigration authorities that he was part of the Nazi extermination machinery. Had he dons so he would have been sent packing back to Germany. In Canadian law if someone who has gained citizenship has been found to have given false testimony when applying for landed immigrant status and later citizenship, that citizenship would be revoked. This man lived in Canada for close to 70 years, comfortably and secure.

Scene during the deportation of Jews from Lublin. 1942.

It is the height of mendacity to claim he had no knowledge of what was happening, and what he was accomplice to. Since proceedings were initiated to remove him from Canada and extradite him to Germany -- with or without official status there -- he has taken advantage of all the opportunities Canada afforded him to challenge the government and appeal his removal. On three separate occasions his appeals succeeded; on the final one, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled against him.

There is no question that quite a few Nazi war criminals entered Canada after the war. Jewish immigrant Holocaust survivors in the years directly after World War II had the grim experience of coming face to face with a familiar countenance, one they last saw holding them prisoner at work and concentration camps. Mr. Oberlander's identity and role was discovered -- better late than never -- and he now faces the consequences. Many more were never identified and lived the kind of lives their actions during the war denied millions of Jewish men, women and children.