Greek repression “blatant and undemocratic” – nationalist fact-finding mission

The undemocratic repression of Golden Dawn was ordered personally by the EU’s puppet Prime Minister, Antonis Samaras, whose government is in blatant breach of European human rights laws.

These are the key findings of a delegation of political leaders and lawyers sent to Athens by the leading pan-European nationalist organisation, the Alliance for Peace and Freedom.

The first fact-finding mission organised by the European party Alliance for Peace and Freedom (APF) was held in Greece in December 2014 to investigate the issue of the political persecution against the Greek party Golden Dawn. The APF delegation attended several meetings in Athens, included a private meeting between the MEP Udo Voigt and the leaders of Golden Dawn, including MP Nikos Michaloliakos, who is currently jailed in the Koridallos prison, near Athens.

The delegations was composed by MEP Udo Voigt, from Germany, MEP Lampros Fountulis, from Greece, MEP Geogios Epitideios, from Greece, the president of the APF and former MEP Roberto Fiore, from Italy, Mr. Michail Kusnetsov, a lawyer from Russia, and Mr. Michele Saponaro, a lawyer from Italy.

It is obvious that the wave of imprisonment against members of the Greek party Golden Dawn is a planned political persecution, that is clearly intended to lead to the destruction of the party. The fact that the trial has still not yet started pushes legally-minded people to the conclusion that a political persecution is being launched in parallel with criminal activity that culminated with the murder of 2 young GD activists. The objective is to destroy GD at all levels.

Having studied all the available facts, the lawyers in the APF delegation concluded that there are is no evidence against the imprisoned MPs and that, as a result, they should all be released in March 2015, when the Greek legal deadline for trying or releasing prisoners expires.

In total 70 members of the party are awaiting trial, included 8 members of the Greek Parliament. The rest of the parliamentary group are also subjected to several serious and totally unjustifiable restrictions on their personal freedom.

Among other conclusions, the delegation found two clear pieces of evidence that prove that the wave of arrests against Golden Dawn was ordered personally by the Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras. This evidence is published and available on the official website of Golden Dawn.

The first is a recording of a conversation in which the secretary of the party of the Prime Minister Samaras admits precisely that. The other one is a taped conversation of the Prime Minister himself ordering the imprisonment of three leading Golden Dawn Members of Parliament – leaders, in other words, of the most outspoken opposition in Greek politics.

The lawyers who took part in the delegation announced that this is a violation of the Greek Constitution. Furthermore the lawyers concluded that the imprisonment of people without granting them the possibility of a fair trial constitutes a breach of articles 5 and 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

At the end of this month, Greece will face new elections. Golden Dawn does not have any chance to make a proper electoral campaign, because of the imprisonments of its MPs and because the funds from the Parliament are blocked until the Deputies are released. In spite of this support for the party continue to grow in the polls and it would probably reconfirm the result obtained in the last European elections, with a percentage of 9.4%. This is a sign that, despite the arrests, the party is still growing and is supported by more and more ordinary Greeks.

The fact-finding mission was successfully accomplished and the APF will continue in the next months to take on the case of Golden Dawn, reporting its findings at both legal and institutional level.