April 25, 2012
Investigation Into Fate of Wallenberg Must Continue
(Jerusalem Post)
By MAX GRUNBERG, DAVID MATAS, SUSANNE BERGER
With Russias failure to produce conclusive
evidence about the fate of Raoul Wallenberg in Soviet captivity,
the Swedish government must continue to press for direct
access to essential archives and to locate witnesses who
may have factual information about what happened to the
Swedish diplomat who saved thousands of Hungarian Jews from
Nazi persecution in 1944, only to disappear himself in the
Soviet Union in 1945.
For decades, Russia has claimed that Raoul Wallenberg died
on July 17, 1947, in Moscows Lubyanka prison. Yet
in 2009, Russian officials finally admitted that Wallenberg
had been interrogated as late as July 23, 1947, six days
after his official death date. It also became clear that
Russia had intentionally withheld this crucial fact from
an official Swedish-Russian working group that had investigated
Wallenbergs fate from 1991-2001.
In spite of numerous requests to Russian authorities to
produce uncensored copies of the July 23, 1947, Lubyanka
interrogation register and related documents, Russian officials
so far have not released any additional records to show
what happened to Raoul Wallenberg after this date. The new
information proves that vital documentation about the case
continues to exist in Russian archives and that the case
can and should be solved.
Russian officials have repeatedly stated that they continue
to assist Sweden in replying to specific requests for additional
information about the fate of Raoul Wallenberg. However,
Russian officials have not allowed scholars access to a
variety of key files and materials that remain classified
in Russian archives and that are essential for solving the
case.
In addition to the previously cited prison interrogation
registers, this material includes among other things
Soviet foreign intelligence records from Hungary
and Sweden for the period 1943-1945, which would shed light
on the reasons why that Soviet authorities decided to arrest
Wallenberg; and uncensored access to investigative files
of a number of prisoners closely associated with Raoul Wallenberg
in captivity, as well as key correspondence records between
the Soviet security services and the Soviet leadership
such as the Central Committee and the Politburo which
would reveal how Soviet leaders handled Wallenbergs[his
what?] before and after 1947.
Until this documentation has been reviewed, no final conclusions
about Wallenbergs fate can be drawn. What is the Swedish
government doing to ensure that Russian authorities provide
access to this documentation? The answer is, unfortunately,
not much.
As stated on the Swedish Foreign Ministrys website,
the full clarification of this issue remains an important
priority: The main purpose of research studies should
be to produce conclusive evidence regarding Raoul Wallenbergs
ultimate fate and, if he is still alive, enable him to return
to Sweden.
However, the Swedish Foreign Ministry considers the Wallenberg
case a historical issue and has therefore chosen not to
make any direct requests for clarification about Prisoner
Nr. 7 to Russias President Dmitry Medvedev or
his elected successor, the current Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin. Instead, official Swedish demands have been limited
to asking Russia merely for an open archival policy.
ON JANUARY 17, 2012 of this year, the Associated Press widely
reported that in 1991, Russias Security Services had
actively interfered with the work of the first official
International Wallenberg Commission when it was trying to
review relevant records in Russian archives. Swedish Foreign
Minister Card Bildt immediately announced that he would
be sending Ambassador Hans Magnusson on a fact-finding mission
to Moscow to determine what additional information about
Raoul Wallenbergs fate remains available in Russia.
As former Swedish chairman of the Swedish-Russian working
group, Magnusson is well qualified for the task. However,
while the dispatching of a special emissary to Russia to
request an update about the Wallenberg case
is undoubtedly welcome, implementing procedures to ensure
meaningful access to important documentation so that a credible
investigation can be conducted is quite another. It remains
to be seen how the Swedish Foreign Office structures this
new official inquiry so that it does not turn out to be
simply a play for the galleries.
Unfortunately both Mr. Bildt and Mr. Magnusson have already
publicly stated that we should not have great expectations
of about the new efforts, essentially consigning the inquiry
to failure before it has even gotten off the ground. This
attitude is unfortunate, especially since Mr. Bildt apparently
felt that additional official steps in the Raoul Wallenberg
case had become warranted.
A scheduled conference on Wallenberg in Moscow on May 28,
2012, coordinated by the Institute for Contemporary History
of the Russian Academy of Science and co-sponsored by the
Swedish Foreign Ministry, does not plan to address the question
of his fate, and the issue will receive only a fleeting
mention in the week-long program surrounding the conference.
Over more than six decades, Sweden has made surprisingly
little efforts to engage international organizations and
institutions in the search for Raoul Wallenberg. It took
a full six years after his disappearance, until 1951, before
Swedish officials asked US authorities for assistance in
the case. In 1995, the International Red Cross headquarters
in Geneva, Switzerland, confirmed that the subject
of... Raoul Wallenberg is known to us only from the press
and different campaigns organized on his behalf. Although
the head of the Swedish Red Cross, Folke Bernadotte, had
sent an appeal to help locate Raoul Wallenberg to his Soviet
counterpart by January 1947 to help locate Wallenberg, no
official case record seems to have ever been established
with the ICRC.
Similarly surprising is the fact that Sweden has so far
not filed a formal motion concerning Raoul Wallenberg with
the UN Working Group on Enforced Disappearance. The UN General
Assembly adopted the International Convention for the Protection
of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, was adopted
on December 20, 2006, by the UN General Assembly and addthe
convention /came into force on December 23, 2010. The convention
specifically safeguards the rights of the victims and their
relatives to know the truth regarding the circumstances
of the enforced disappearance, the progress and results
of the investigation and the fate of the disappeared person.
With the help of other countries, Sweden could pursue additional
ways to press Russia for the truth about Raoul Wallenberg.
On April 19, the US Congress honored Wallenberg, who is
an honorary American citizen of the US, with the Congressional
Gold Medal.
As it happens, the US Senate is currently debating the
repeal of the so-called Jackson-Vanick Amendment. Adopted
in 1974, that amendment has long been a thorn in Russias
side since it makes trade with Russia contingent on allowing
Jewish immigration. Several US lawmakers and Russian human
rights advocates have called for a linkage between Russias
compliance with international human rights laws and the
lifting of the Jackson-Vanick Amendment. They are sponsoring
a bill called the Sergei Magnitsky Rule of Law Accountability
Act of 2011.
Magnitsky, a lawyer, died in Russian custody two years
ago after publicizing numerous corrupt practices. The Magnitsky
Act provides for a number of prominent Russians to be included
on a US visa ban list and to have their assets frozen in
the US. Sweden could and should demand that the full truth
about Raoul Wallenberg is also be added as a requirement
before repeal of the Jackson-Vanick Amendment can proceed.
In recent months the Swedish Foreign Ministry has rejected
a number of other measures aimed at obtaining clarity about
Mr. Wallenbergs fate, including a request (filed by
Raoul Wallenbergshis sister-in-law, Matilda von Dardel,
and other relatives) that Interpol issue a so-called Yellow
Notice in the case, an international alert that would
allow police agencies in member countries to become actively
involved in the efforts to determine his fate by assisting
in the location of witnesses and by taking other investigative
measures.
The Russian Federation is a member of Interpol, and in
2008 Vladimir Putin personally addressed its General Assembly
meeting in St. Petersburg. Already in 2007, Interpols
Secretary-General Ronald K. Noble had confirmed in a letter
that his agency would in principle be willing to issue a
Yellow Notice on behalf of Raoul Wallenberg if the Swedish
National Central Bureau would officially file such a request.
After delaying a decision for years, the Swedish government
formally rejected the request for a Yellow Notice this past
January 2012, stating that it would complicate Swedens
political working relationship with Russia, including in
the area of archival research. While this is undoubtedly
an important concern, unless Sweden can move Russia to provide
meaningful access to its records in the Wallenberg case,
the Swedish government will have to find additional ways
to ensure that researchers can conduct a proper inquiry.
The matter should be treated with great urgency. The Swedish
government should be sure to use every resource at its disposal
to encourage witnesses to step forward before it is too
late.
Moreover, Swedish officials should work more closely with
countries like the United States, Canada and Israel, the
International Red Cross, international police agencies,
including such as Interpol, various human rights groups
and national intelligence services, as well as qualified
experts and scholars to press Russia to finally reveal all
available facts in the case.
Max Grunberg is founder of the Raoul Wallenberg Honorary
Citizen Committee, Israel. David Matas is an international
human rights lawyer. Susanne Berger is a historical researcher
and Wallenberg expert.
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