ATHENS – The neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, which has 18 seats in the Greek Parliament, has been widely criticized for attacking immigrants. But now its members seem to have a new target: politicians.
On Thursday, hours after the police broke up a Golden Dawn effort to distribute free food – to “native Greeks” only – a Golden Dawn legislator apparently tried to punch the mayor of Athens in the face but missed and hit a 12-year-old girl instead.
Witnesses said that the lawmaker, Giorgos Germenis, a former bassist in a heavy metal band, had a gun in his pocket as well, and that the mayor’s security detail had blocked him from pulling it. The confrontation came after the mayor, Giorgos Kaminis, asked the police to stop the food distribution program in Syntagma Square.
An amateur video posted on the Internet shows members of the mayor’s security detail restraining Mr. Germenis and repeatedly telling him to “leave the gun alone.”
The episode occurred in a municipal building where employees were distributing candles to children for the Greek Orthodox Easter, which is Sunday. The girl, who had come to collect candles, had a bruised forehead, but was not seriously injured, while the mayor was unharmed, the employees said.
Political parties from across the spectrum immediately condemned the episode.
This was by no means the first time a member of Parliament from Golden Dawn had apparently come to blows with another politician. In June, the party’s spokesman, Ilias Kasidiaris, attacked two legislators, both of them women, during a televised debate, a stunt that lifted the party’s popularity. In March, Parliament voted to divest Mr. Kasidiaris of the immunity that protects lawmakers, and he now faces trial in the attack.
In October, Parliament voted to lift the immunity of Mr. Germenis and another Golden Dawn lawmaker, Panagiotis Iliopoulos, over a string of assaults on immigrant vendors in Rafina, a port near Athens.
Immediately after the episode on Thursday, Mr. Kaminis told an Athens radio station that Mr. Germenis had tried to pull a gun on him, and Mr. Kaminis’s spokesman said the mayor would file a lawsuit. A police spokesman could not confirm whether Mr. Germenis was armed, but said a prosecutor was expected to ask Parliament to decide on whether to lift his immunity in connection with the confrontation.
In a statement, Golden Dawn denied that a girl had been hit and said it would sue Mr. Kaminis and his security guards, The Associated Press reported.
Golden Dawn’s lawmakers and supporters have organized several food handouts across the country since the party was elected to Parliament in June on an anti-austerity, anti-immigrant platform, including one such event in Syntagma Square last summer.
The mayor has since banned such events in Athens’s central square, and he had pledged to prevent Golden Dawn’s event on Thursday.
In comments to reporters, Mr. Kaminis said the most important thing was that the “hate fueled” food handout had been thwarted. He also spoke of a “victory of the democratic state over thuggery.”
Golden Dawn, once an obscure organization with a penchant for Nazi symbols, has become Greece’s third-most popular party, according to opinion polls, tapping into growing public exasperation with three years of austerity measures and a continuing influx of immigrants.
Its activities have fueled concern among human rights organizations. Last month, the Council of Europe’s human rights commissioner, Nils Muiznieks, described Golden Dawn as “a neo-Nazi and violent political party,” urging that it be banned under international human rights treaties.
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Political Scuffle in Athens Bruises Young Bystander
ATHENS – The neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, which has 18 seats in the Greek Parliament, has been widely criticized for attacking immigrants. But now its members seem to have a new target: politicians.