BUDAPEST/BRATISLAVA (AFP)--Top Nazi war crimes suspect Laszlo Csatary, accused of overseeing the deportation of thousands of Jews to their deaths during World War II, denied all allegations against him at a first hearing before prosecutors in Hungary on Tuesday, his lawyer said.   

"Csatary denied all allegations against him," the 97-year-old man's lawyer, Gabor Horvath, told journalists after a three-hour closed-door hearing.   

Csatary, full name Laszlo Csizsik-Csatary, helped run the Jewish ghetto in Kosice, a town that was visited in April 1944 by Adolf Eichmann, a key figure in the Nazis' Final Solution, the Simon Wiesenthal Center says.

He is accused by the Wiesenthal Center of organising the  deportation to their deaths of some 16,000 Jews from the ghetto of Kosice in present-day southeast Slovakia..  

While there between 1941 and 1944, Csatary beat and brutalized Jews and sent 16,000 to their deaths in Ukraine and to the gas chambers at the Auschwitz extermination camp, it said.  

In 1948, a court in then-Czechoslovakia sentenced him to death in absentia, but he made it to Canada where he lived and worked as an art dealer before being stripped of his citizenship in the 1990s.  

He ended up in Budapest where he has lived freely ever since, until the Wiesenthal Center alerted Hungarian authorities last year.

No formal charges have been laid by Hungary against Csatary, who appeared in person before the prosecutors in Budapest at Tuesday's hearing.

In Slovakia, Justice Minister Tomas Borec said he wanted  Csatary to be tried on Slovak soil.

"It is my personal interest that Csatary ... be extradited to Slovakia and imprisoned here," Borec told journalists in Bratislava, echoing a call made last week by his country's Jewish community.  

"This is one of the last chances to punish crimes dating from World War II," he added.

While there between 1941 and 1944, Csatary beat and brutalized Jews and sent 16,000 to their deaths in Ukraine and to the gas chambers at the Auschwitz extermination camp, it said.  

In 1948, a court in then-Czechoslovakia sentenced him to death in absentia, but he made it to Canada where he lived and worked as an art dealer before being stripped of his citizenship in the 1990s.
 

According to justice ministry, a Slovak court would most likely give
Csatary life sentence.
   

Accused by the Wiesenthal Center of organising the World War II deportation
to their deaths of some 16,000 Jews from the ghetto of Kosice in present-day
southeast Slovakia -- the ethnic Hungarian has protested his innocence.
   Csatary, full name Laszlo Csizsik-Csatary, helped run the Jewish ghetto in
Kosice, a town that was visited in April 1944 by Adolf Eichmann, a key figure
in the Nazis' Final Solution, the Wiesenthal Center says.
   While there between 1941 and 1944, Csatary beat and brutalized Jews and
sent 16,000 to their deaths in Ukraine and to the gas chambers at the
Auschwitz extermination camp, it said.
   In 1948, a court in then-Czechoslovakia sentenced him to death in absentia,
but he made it to Canada where he lived and worked as an art dealer before
being stripped of his citizenship in the 1990s.
   He ended up in Budapest where he has lived freely ever since, until the
Wiesenthal Center alerted Hungarian authorities last year.
   tab/mas/ach