NEW YORK -- The Justice Department report that led to the barring of Kurt Waldheim from the United States will be released for the first time this week.

The report cites Nazi documents indicating that the former United Nations secretary-general "assisted or participated in" the deportation, mistreatment, and execution of civilians and Allied soldiers in World War II.

L A Justice Department spokesman, John Russell, said yesterday

that he could not say why the report by the department's Office of Special Investigations had been ordered withheld by the Bush administration since April 27, 1987.

Release of the 204-page report, which led to Mr. Waldheim's TTC name being placed on what is called the immigration "Watchlist," had been sought by news organizations and the World Jewish Congress.

Yesterday, Neal Sher, who was director of the Office of Special Investigations from 1983 until recently, said that the report "shows that the decision made in 1987 at the highest levels of government -- Attorney General [Edwin] Meese and Secretary of State [George] Shultz -- was fully justified and warranted."

The report states that in memorandums contesting the attempt to bar him from the United States, Mr. Waldheim, who was secretary-general from 1972 to 1982 and later served as president of Austria, "offered explanations of historical events which are so completely inconsistent with documented facts as to smack of rank distortion."