Nazi War Crimes Interagency Working Group

The Nazi War Crimes and Japanese Imperial Government Records Interagency Working Group (IWG) locates, identifies, inventories, and recommends for declassification, currently classified U.S. records relating to Nazi and Japanese Imperial Government war crimes. Once declassified, these records are released to the American public. The group, consisting of high-level representatives from federal agencies and public members, was established by the Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act and the Japanese Imperial Government Disclosure Act.

Since 1999, the IWG has declassified and opened to the public an estimated 8 million pages of documents, including 1.2 million pages of OSS records; 74,000 pages of CIA name and subject files; more than 350,000 pages of FBI subject files; and nearly 300,000 pages of Army intelligence files. The once secret records are helping to shape our understanding of the Holocaust, war crimes, World War II and postwar activities of U.S. and Allied intelligence agencies.

The IWG has issued two interim reports to Congress (in October 1999 and March 2002), and it issues news releases and occasional newsletters, and has published a book. Several publications are forthcoming.