Greece: Court Condemns the Neo-Nazi Party of Golden Dawn as a Criminal Organisation

[Abdülmecid I]

Good news for a change, as today the court's verdict has decided that the Neo-Nazi party of the Golden Dawn is a criminal organisation. Not due to any ideological reasons, although the group's endorsement of Neo-Nazism had been amply demonstrated during the process, but, according to the penal law. It took almost 7 years for the trial to be completed (the penalties have not been determined yet), but it's finally over. For an overview of the trial, I recommend the Golden Dawn Watch website. The charges were firstly filed, when a para-military force of Golden Dawn members assaulted and stabbed to death, Pavlos Fyssas, a leftist musician in the autumn of 2013. A murder for which the Führer of the party, Mihaloliakos assumed full, political responsibility. That murder, together with two attacks against the members of a trade union controlled by the Communist Party of Greece and against Egyptian expatriates seasonally working as fishermen, were the basis for the verdict. The leadership of the Golden Dawn, including the Führer Mihaloliakos and his second-in-command, Kasidiaris, who had just established an offshoot party, were found guilty for leading the criminal organisation, while several other low-ranking members will await punishment for joining it and for the murder of Fyssas.



To give some background, the Golden Dawn was one of the few (I can only think of Jobbik in Hungary, but they might have been more, especially around the Baltics), openly Neo-Nazi parties that succeeded in entering the national Parliament of the European Union country with a relatively impressive popularity (7%). Even before their electoral victories, they boasted of a long history of violence (Mihaloliakos himself has a criminal record for terrorist activities, as a protest for the fall of the military dictatorship and the restoration of democracy), but their extremism had escalated since then. They committed several assaults and even murdered a Pakistani immigrant, although their anti-establishment rhetoric had been mellowed down. For instance, they also enjoyed a cordial relationshp with the ship-owner lobby, probably the strongest (politically and economically) ''industry'' in Greece. They argued for fiscal privileges for the wealthiest businesssmen of the country, they were treated friendly by Marinakis, the most notorious ship-owning magnate, and his media empire, and even the attack against the trade unionists of the shipyard should be interpreted as a manifestation of that alliance.

Therefore, the verdict is great news, since the leadership will remain behind bars in the foreseeable future and the Neo-Nazis will lose any money they might have been entitled to from the public treasury. However, it should also be noted that the public support for the group had already eroded, not because of the murder (Golden Dawn performed very well even in 2015, two years after the assassination), but because of how cowardly and opportunistically the Neo-Nazis reacted. Even the elite refused to recognize any responsibility, played innocent and even abandoned the sinking ship, in order to avoid any negative verdict. Most of the violence stopped completely, Patelis, the chief of the security batallion that murdered Fyssas, fainted during the trial and Boukouras, a MP notorious for throwing immigrants into the sea, begged his colleagues for forgiveness, amidst a tearful appeal at theit magnaminity. I wonder, did Göring also cry in Nuremberg? And the chubby Air Marshal faced the prospect of execution, not imprisonment...



Overall, I think the affair justified Marx' quote about the farcial repetitions of history, although innocent human beings still died. Of course, the authorities reacted very slowly (even during the trial, the prosecutor herself asked for the charges to be dropped) and any judicial efforts were undermined by the affiliation of the law enforcement with the Neo-Nazis. However, the result definitely leaves room for optimism and proves that Neo-Nazism can actually be dealt with through legal procedures, something that was probably not true in the Interwar years. The crucial difference is, in my opinion, the modern extreme right relies on selfish populists and on ignorant voters, not on determined ideologues and impoverished, desperate masses, while the menace of Bolshevism no longer exists, so neither the oligarchs nor the more moderate conservatives have any substantial reason to pander to the far-right. Neo-Nazis may sound tough behind the safety of their keyboard, but once the consequences arrive, the movement will quickly fragment and gradually evaporate.

For an interesting documentary about the Golden Dawn, I suggest the French ''Une affaire personnelle'':



The best part starts in the 41st minute, where the local Gauleiter instructs an inferior member on how to avoid the potentially embarrassing questions of the journalist about the party's Antisemitism and Holocaust denial.