He mounted a systematic attack on the infamous claims of Robert Faurisson denying the existence of the Nazi concentration camps (Les Assassins de la m?ire : “Un Eichmann de papier” et autres textes sur le r?sionnisme, 1987; Assassins of Memory: essays on the denial of the Holocaust, 1992). In 1971 he joined with Michel Foucault in founding the Groupe d’information sur les prisons, which took up the rights of prisoners judged victims of injustice. Pierre Vidal-Naquet had a double life as a fearless public campaigner against modern lies and as one of the founders of the new French scholarship on the Ancient Greek world. In the first role he came to prominence as the chief exposer of the systematic use of torture by the French government in Algeria.
Approached by the widow of a young university teacher of mathematics who had “disappeared” in 1957 in Algiers while in the custody of a paratroop regiment, he launched an investigation which resulted in a famous book L’Affaire Audin (“The Audin Affair”, 1958), which concluded that Maurice Audin had been tortured to death, and that the military authorities had concocted an elaborate charade of an alleged escape from custody; the murderers were named, but what was important to Vidal-Naquet was the complicity of the authorities up to the highest level: in 2000 new evidence revealed the truth of his claims.The subsequent public campaign against systematic torture in Indo-China and other French colonial territories led to his books La Raison d’?t (“Reasons of State”, 1962), Torture: cancer of democracy (1963, later published in France as La Torture dans la r?blique 1972), and Les Crimes de l’arm?fran?se (“The Crimes of the French Army”, 1975).He took part in the events of 1968, and with one of the student leaders (now a professor at the Sorbonne) compiled the essential dossier of student documents, Journal de la commune ?diante (1969; translated as The French Student Uprising, 1971). Instead, Pope John Paul II made it a Pontifical Council in 1988.Although he lacked what the Italians call “presenza” – something which ensured he never became pope – Willebrands had passion for his cause and a sense of humour which made him an effective partner in the Catholic Church’s ecumenical dialogue.Felix Corley. Pierre Vidal-Naquet, historian: born Paris 23 July 1930; Directeur d’?des, Ecole des Hautes Etudes 1966-98, Director, Centre Louis Gernet 1984-98; married 1952 Genevi? Railhac (three sons); died Nice, France 29 July 2006. In 1985 he fought successfully to prevent his beloved Secretariat being subordinated to the powerful Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in a Vatican curial reorganisation, arguing that this would send the wrong signal to other Christians.

Willebrands accompanied Slipyi from Moscow into exile in Rome.It was left to Willebrands on the penultimate day of the Vatican Council in December 1965 to read out the momentous declaration cancelling the mutual excommunication of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches in 1054.Willebrands was appointed a titular bishop in 1964 and succeeded Bea as president of the Secretariat for Christian Unity in 1969 in the wake of his former boss’s death. Within weeks he was named a cardinal by Pope Paul (indeed, at the time of his death Willebrands would be the oldest cardinal).Kept on in his post by Popes John Paul I and John Paul II, the multilingual Willebrands travelled tirelessly to ecumenical gatherings, inevitably becoming known as the “Flying Dutchman”. Although a pan-Orthodox conference in Rhodes in 1962 had decided not to take up Vatican invitations to attend, Willebrands’ personal mission to the Moscow Patriarchate two weeks before the Council opened saw the Russian Church (with Soviet backing) break ranks and steal a march on its old rival, Constantinople. Other Orthodox Churches then also sent observers.Willebrands had to defend the presence of the Russian Orthodox from criticism by exiled Ukrainian Catholic bishops, whose Church had been “abolished” in Ukraine in an unholy alliance of the Soviet state and the Moscow Patriarchate. He was helped in February 1963 by the Soviets’ dramatic decision to free the Ukrainian Catholic leader Iosyf Slipyi from labour camp and send him into exile. A key contact in Rome from 1951 was Bea, then Rector of the Jesuit Biblical Institute, who insisted he come to see him each time he was in Rome.The group was in informal contact with the newly founded World Council of Churches, which brought together many Protestant and Orthodox Churches. It was Willebrands’ contacts in and via the WCC – together with his strong personal commitment – that led Bea to bring him to the Vatican to deepen Catholic commitment to the cause.These were exciting times for a rising generation of intellectual Catholics, and Willebrands played an important role at the Second Vatican Council (1962-65).

The Secretariat for Christian Unity prepared initial drafts of the Council’s documents on ecumenism, religious freedom, relations with non-Christian religions and divine revelation. Without the Secretariat’s behind-the-scenes work, some of these key documents might never have been adopted.Moreover, without Willebrands’ charm offensive, no Orthodox Church might have attended. With colleagues he travelled round a ruined Europe seeking out other Catholic theologians who had become ecumenical enthusiasts as a result of wartime co-operation between Churches.The group that Willebrands founded in 1948, the Catholic Conference on Ecumenical Questions, with more than 50 members, did not seek Vatican approval but kept it informed of its work. Willebrands had been chosen in 1946 as president of the St Willibrord Association, which worked to overcome the Catholic/Protestant divide in his homeland. Willebrands became its secretary.Bea, an ecumenical pioneer, had been watching Willebrands’ enthusiasm for overcoming divisions within the Christian world. It was there that he lived through the Second World War and German occupation. In 1945 he became rector, a post he held until being summoned to Rome in June 1960 by Cardinal Augustin Bea, head of the Vatican’s newly created Secretariat for Christian Unity.