Washington  - In the latest of legal scuffles, alleged Nazi death camp guard John Demjanjuk was given a reprieve Thursday until next week in his fight to stay in the United States instead of being deported to Germany to stand trial.

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Ohio asked justice officials for a medical report on the 89-year-old man, setting a deadline for April 23 for the information.

Demjanjuk's lawyer and family have argued that he is too frail and ill to stand trial in Germany.

The court ordered the government, which is pushing for Demjanjuk's deportation, to describe its "plans for transportation to Germany" and provide a doctor's report "which forms the basis for its conclusion that the petitioners medical condition is such that he is stable enough to travel safely."

The decision was posted on the court's website.

The order puts another stone in the way of the US government to resolve the 20-year-old case which has taken Demjanjuk to Israel, where he was sentenced to death in the 1980s but then released on appeal for his alleged role in killing tens of thousands of Jews at Treblinka Concentration Camp in Poland.

The current case involves Demjanjuk's alleged role at another death camp, Sobibor, in Poland. A German court has issued charges against him in the case, and asked the United States to deliver him to stand trial.

Earlier Thursday, the US board of immigration appeals in Virginia ruled in favour of the government by refusing to block Demjanjuk's removal from the United States.

On Tuesday, immigration agents removed Demjanjuk in his wheelchair from his home in Seven Hills, Ohio, for the transport to Germany. But they had to return him after the Circuit Court of Appeals in Ohio granted a temporary stay.

In Thursday's order, the Circuit Court was following up by asking for more information from prosecutors as well as Demjanjuk's lawyers before making a final decision.

German authorities allege that the Ukrainian-born Demjanjuk, then 23, worked from March-September 1943 as a guard in Poland at Sobibor concentration camp, where at least 29,000 Jews died during that time. Prosecutors in Munich issued an arrest warrant for him last month.

Following World War II, Demjanjuk lived in Germany as a refugee until 1952 when he changed his first name from Ivan to John and moved to the United States.

Demjanjuk was acquitted in 1993 by the Israeli Supreme Court of charges that he worked at a different death camp, Treblinka, saving him from the death sentence of a lower court in Israel.

But after his return to the US, he was stripped of his citizenship for lying about his immigration status. (dpa)