A Greek appeals court on Wednesday upheld the 2020 convictions of leaders and associates of the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party.
In 2020, a court found the group guilty of operating as a criminal organization while posing as a political party. The decision followed a five-year trial that concluded with the party’s leader, Nikos Michaloliakos, and other senior members being convicted of running and participating in that criminal organization. Michaloliakos, a Holocaust denier, was among those found guilty.
In a unanimous ruling, a five-judge panel at the Criminal Appeal Court in Athens confirmed the convictions of 42 Golden Dawn members and associates who had appealed their sentences. Michaloliakos, 68, was sentenced in 2020 to 13 years in prison but was released on parole last year on health grounds.
Greece’s conservative Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis welcomed the verdict, saying in parliament: “This concerns a traumatic chapter in our parliamentary life, one that I hope and wish we can now leave firmly behind us.”
What you need to know about Golden Dawn
Golden Dawn began as a neo-Nazi party in the 1980s and rose to prominence during Greece’s financial crisis, holding seats in parliament between 2012 and 2019. The party built support on an anti-austerity and anti-immigrant platform and became the country’s third-most popular party at the crisis’s peak.
A criminal probe into Golden Dawn intensified after the 2013 murder of left-wing rapper Pavlos Fyssas. The party member who stabbed Fyssas was convicted of murder in 2020, and the appeals court on Wednesday upheld that conviction as well.
Edited by: Dmytro Hubenko