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Kastrioti1443
09-19-2013, 11:31 AM
Police Raid Golden Dawn Office in Athens After a Killing ( The end of this party is coming)


http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/19/world/europe/police-raid-golden-dawn-office-in-athens-after-a-killing.html?_r=0



ATHENS — The police raided the offices of Greece’s far-right Golden Dawn Party on Wednesday, and government officials scrambled for ways to clamp down on the group after thousands of demonstrators took to the streets in several Greek cities to protest the killing of an antifascist activist that the police attributed to a Golden Dawn sympathizer.

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In the most serious violence attributed to Golden Dawn since it gained power in Greece’s Parliament last year, a man who the police said admitted to being in the party was arrested after the fatal stabbing in an Athens suburb early on Wednesday of Pavlos Fyssas, 34, a leftist hip-hop singer who spoke out against the group.

Mr. Fyssas, who used the stage name Killah P., was stabbed early Wednesday, just after midnight, as he left a cafe after watching a soccer match on television with friends. The police told the Greek news media that they received a phone call reporting that around 50 people with clubs were headed toward the cafe, and that officers who arrived on the scene saw two men fighting. The police said the suspect, identified as a 45-year old man, confessed to the killing. Mr. Fyssas’s funeral is scheduled for Thursday.

A spokesman for Golden Dawn, Ilias Kasidiaris, told Parliament on Wednesday that the group was not involved. But leaders in Prime Minister Antonis Samaras’s fragile government coalition signaled that they would tighten legal restrictions in an effort to curb the party.

Golden Dawn’s popularity has climbed in political polls especially among a growing number of Greeks who are increasingly angered by record joblessness, a steady flow of immigrants into the country and the less-than-successful struggle by mainstream parties to mend the effects of a devastating recession. But backlashes have also been mounting against Golden Dawn in recent months. Last week, thousands of Greeks protested in Athens after about 50 Golden Dawn members, wielding bats and crowbars, attacked members of the Communist Party as they hung posters for a youth festival in an Athens suburb, leaving nine people hospitalized with serious injuries. On Wednesday, those protesting Mr. Fyssas’s killing joined thousands of other Greeks who had already been marching to protest a restructuring of Greece’s education system.

Mr. Samaras’s New Democracy Party issued a statement condemning the killing on Wednesday, calling it “the result of the Nazi belief of hatred nurtured and promoted by Golden Dawn.” In a speech earlier this week, Mr. Samaras warned of a “blind spot” in which extremist forces could gain steam in coming months “after the economy starts to turn, but before improvement is felt by people.” He added: “This will be the last chance for extremism to derail the process. It’s what makes the next few months critical.”

Mr. Samaras was in Brussels on Tuesday extolling prospects for Greece’s beleaguered economy, which may need new rescue loans on top of two bailout packages. Greece’s creditors are scheduled to return to Athens next week, and Mr. Samaras told officials in Brussels that he would not impose any more austerity on Greek citizens.

Painful cuts to salaries and pensions continue to take a toll on average Greeks and on the economy. The severity of a five-year recession eased slightly last month, when the economy shrank at an annual rate of 4.6 percent in the three months to July, compared with a 5.6 percent decline in the first quarter. With talk of a Greek exit from the euro having faded, tourism surged this summer, giving the economy a needed jolt. Yet record unemployment of 26.9 percent, and nearly 60 percent for young people, has unleashed a wave of discontent for Golden Dawn to ride, helping it to rise further in political polls.

Evangelos Venezelos, the leader of the Pasok Party, the main partner in Mr. Samaras’s coalition government, stopped just short on Wednesday of calling for Golden Dawn to be outlawed. “Golden Dawn uses violence as its main tool and must be treated as a criminal organization,” he said. “It has now gone beyond all limits. The state must intervene.”

Greece’s public order minister, Nikos Dendias, on Wednesday urged the government to consider changing the law to define what constitutes a criminal gang. Such a move could box in the party, whose members — including lawmakers serving in Parliament — have been accused of carrying out numerous criminal acts, especially against immigrants.