OS JUDEUS DO VATICANO: TENTATIVA DE SALVAÇÃO DE CATÓLICOS ...

In order to maintain its humanitarian image and save its pride, the Vatican made efforts and succeeded in June 1939 in obtaining a promise from Brazil of 3,000 visas for non-Aryan Catholics (i.e. converted Jews) from Italy and Germany. The Brazilian bureaucracy did everything possible to prevent the use of these visas, imposing various conditions. Furthermore, Brazil's ambassador in Berlin, Ciro de Freites Vale, and its consul in Hamburg, Joaquim de Souza Ribeiro, refused to give out any of the 2,000 visas allotted to Germany. In Brazil, the Justice Minister, pro-Nazi Francisco Campos, was given authority on immigration policy over the head of the Foreign Minister, pro-American Oswaldo Aranha, and issued instructions in April 1941 establishing racial criteria for "Israelites" to be barred from immigration. Concludes that out of 3,000 visas, only 959 were actually issued, mostly in Italy, and that only 803 actually used them. (The names of the 959 are given on pp. 32-55.) Outlines, also, the rescue efforts of Brazil's ambassador to the Vatican, Hildebrando Pinto Accioly.