Toronto, Thursday, Aug 12, 2004

Associated Press

Knoxville, Tenn. – Holocaust denier Ernst Zündel is entitled to a hearing to challenge his deportation to Canada, a federal appeals court says.

Mr. Zündel, 65, has been held in solitary confinement since [January 2003] last year in a detention centre in Toronto, where officials consider him a security threat and are trying to deport him to his native Germany.

A graphic artist and publisher, Mr. Zündel gained notoriety with a 1980 pamphlet questioning the Holocaust and with books bearing such titles as The Hitler We Loved and Why.

He lived in Canada for decades. In 2000, he moved to the United States on a temporary visa. He married Ingrid Rimland, a naturalized citizen from the former Soviet Union. They moved to Tennessee, opened an art gallery and maintained Mr. Zündel’s Holocaust denier website.

In February, 2003, U.S. immigration agents arrested Mr. Zündel for overstaying his visa and for failing to follow through on his attempts to attain permanent residence here.

U.S. District Judge James Jarvis refused to hear a petition then to stop his deportation. The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati ruled last week that Mr. Zündel is entitled to the hearing.

The Justice Department contends that he has already been deported, rendering his appeal moot. The appeals court said, however, that that was a matter for the U.S. District Court in Knoxville to decide.

Mr. Zündel faces hate crimes charges in Germany over his writings.

 Our dossier on the Ernst Zündel case