Victory of bloggers over Declan Ganley's multi million far right scam as UK policy director resigns over racist fascism in Libertas

Victory of bloggers over Declan Ganley's multi million far right scam

Anti Libertas bloggers are tonight claiming Victory for high lighting the far right agenda of Libertas in Eastern Europe and Ireland. Today I am proud to announce that UK policy director for Libertas has resigned from the party and pulled out of his election bid in the UK North West. he noted that his anti racist message was incompatible with a party that supported and has members who are far right xenophobes and fascists.

Though it took a while the efforts of bloggers has exposed Libertas to the world. We commend Ben Tallis for taking this decision now. As reported here other party members have left over their religious fundamentalism and fascism. Ganley should withdraw from politics now and remove the stain that he and his party have made on Ireland's reputation internationally. Say No to fascism say No to Libertas.

Building An Anti-Racist Coalition - 3

In some very welcome news, the lead candidate of Libertas in the North West, Ben Tallis, has resigned from that party and urged voters to back the Green Party here in the North West. In a statement today, Ben said:

"As the campaign has progressed I have come to realise that while I am committed to Libertas’ goals of reforming the EU from a pro-European perspective and admire the Libertas team in the UK, I cannot agree with certain aspects of the wider European party, notably in the Czech Republic and Poland. Therefore, I will be resigning from the party and the northwest campaign with immediate effect. If Libertas were to win enough votes to return an MEP I would not take up this seat on their behalf.

In the European elections in the Northwest, I will be voting for the Green Party and supporting their campaign. We must fight fascism wherever it appears and in the northwest, the Green party have the best chance of stopping the BNP."

Irish Labour MEP says Libertas are a " fascist party"

Readers of this blog will know that they heard it here first but Proinsias de Rossa has stated that Libertas are a fascist party after Caroline Simons unveiled Libertas plans to restrict European right to travel and work in other EU countries. Mr de Rossa has recently been attacked by Simons because he of his age.

De Rossa also correctly noted that if Libertas's policy was introduced te
"If this system was implemented, tens of thousands of Irish people living and working across the EU would have to be sent home."

Not only are Libertas a far right party they are obviously on lunatics as well. Polling at only 1% in an Irish Times poll Simons and Libertas have now decided to play the race card in their cynical and dangerous bid to garner support.
This blog calls on all politicians and people to boycott Libertas candidates, party workers and supporters.

Saturday, May 16, 2009
Libertas accused of being 'fascist' over migrant plan


HARRY McGEE, Political Staff

IMMIGRATION ROW: LIBERTAS HAS been accused of being “fascist” and of playing the “immigration card” with its plans to impose a two-year limit on migration into Ireland from other European states and a ban on immigrants claiming benefits here.

The party’s Dublin candidate, Caroline Simons, said yesterday that the immigration issue was the “elephant in the room” in the European election campaign.

She said that Libertas was calling for the adoption of a “blue card” throughout the European Union that would allow a citizen of the EU to live in another member state for up to two years as a guest worker as long as they were not a burden on the receiving state.

“This would mean that guest workers from EU member states would no longer be entitled to dole, rent subsidy, or any other state handout. Health and other social benefits would remain a matter for the member state from which the citizen originated,” she said. She said that migrants who require access to schools or other essential social services could apply for them on the same basis as now. If an immigrant lost their job, they would no longer be entitled to remain in the State once the blue card expired. Those in employment could apply for a new blue card after two years.

Describing the approach as one of “common sense”, she said Libertas believed in regulated economic migration in the 27 member states. However, she said the burden placed on Ireland and other EU states was unfair.

She claimed 29,000 new PPS numbers had been issued in Ireland this year to EU nationals when there were 400,000 unemployed people in Ireland.

“The Libertas plan would ensure that these people would come here only to work, study, or explore Ireland. We must reduce the burden to Ireland of caring for inhabitants of other member states and this plan is an equitable and fair way of doing it,” she said.

Her comments followed similar comments on Thursday by Libertas East candidate Raymond O’Malley, who said the time had come to stop the tide of workers coming from accession states.

In relation to asylum seekers from outside the EU, she said that if the Dublin Convention was enforced, Ireland would have fewer asylum seekers. Under the convention, an asylum seeker must be processed in the first State at which they arrive. She said there “was no direct flight from Lagos to Dublin”.

Labour’s Dublin MEP Proinsias de Rossa said he expected nothing else from Libertas which he accused of being a “fascist party”. He said: “They are aligned with all the far-right parties across Europe. It is divisive politics that these parties are involved in. If this system was implemented, tens of thousands of Irish people living and working across the EU would have to be sent home.

Fianna Fáil’s candidate in East Thomas Byrne said the policy was ludicrous. “Immigration is a complex issue and to reduce it to an electoral soundbite is dangerous,” he told Today FM.

At least two of its candidates in Italy, Francesco Storace & Teodoro Buontempo, have a 'neo-fascist' background

At least two of its candidates in Italy, Francesco Storace & Teodoro
Buontempo, have a 'neo-fascist' background:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/italian-right-may-conquer-rome-for-first-time-in-six-decades-815863.html

http://abluteau.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/the-march-of-mussolini-into-italys-mainstream/

Two weeks earlier, a gang of 200 Nazi-skins marched through the
northern Italian city of Vicenza shouting racist slogans and waving
banners with swastika-like emblems. Mainstream political leaders
expressed outrage, but not Teodoro Buontempo, 48, a self-proclaimed
fascist elected to Parliament in March on the ticket of the National
Alliance, the successor to the party founded by followers of Benito
Mussolini. In an interview with the Turin daily La Stampa, Buontempo
said, "I would send them into the midst of society" to proclaim their
values.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,980841,00.html

The head of the MSI’s Rome federation was Teodoro Buontempo. He was
previously the leader of the Fronte Della Gioventu (Youth Front—the
youth organisation of the MSI), and has in the past been closely
involved in attempts to link up with and encompass a sizeable umbrella
grouping of Nazi skinheads known as the Movimento Politico (MP). The
MP is linked to the international “Naziskin” cultural movement Blood
and Honour, and has been implicated in numerous terrorist attacks on
immigrants, Jews and gypsies.
The head of the MSI’s Rome federation was Teodoro Buontempo. He was
previously the leader of the Fronte Della Gioventu (Youth Front—the
youth organisation of the MSI), and has in the past been closely
involved in attempts to link up with and encompass a sizeable umbrella
grouping of Nazi skinheads known as the Movimento Politico (MP). The
MP is linked to the international “Naziskin” cultural movement Blood
and Honour, and has been implicated in numerous terrorist attacks on
immigrants, Jews and gypsies.

http://www.fifthinternational.org/index.php?id=47,184,0,0,1,0

The puri e duri, the hardcore fascist elements, have been gritting
their teeth and screaming defiance. One group wanted to stage a
ceremony to mark the extinguishing of the flame at the “Altar of the
Nation”, the wedding cake-like symbol of Italy that towers over Piazza
Venezia in Rome. The city’s mayor, ironically himself a lifelong
“post-Fascist”, banned it.
But the puri e duri will not give up. “The National Alliance dies, the
Right lives!” declares a flyer scattered about by one of the
hard-right parties, whose symbol sports an oversized flame.
“Today, with the betrayal of our ideas, of our story and our
identity,” roars one of their leaders, Teodoro Buontempo, the national
president of The Right party, “we have the duty to make clearer than
ever that our party was born to assure the continuity of our ideals …
[Join us] to scream your indignation against a ruling class of
trimmers and nobodies.”

http://abluteau.wordpress.com/2009/03/20/the-march-of-mussolini-into-italys-mainstream/

Finacial Times on Ganley

When Ganley interns decided to promote an article in yesterday's Financial Times they obviously neglected to read it.

Oh, a whole article about #Libertas and I in the Financial Times! http://twitclicks.com/t9loabout 13 hours ago from web http://twitter.com/declanganley

Ganley is obviously suffering from paying a mere 700 euro per month month to his spam army.

Ireland's No vote dissenter spreads horizons

By Joshua Chaffin in Brussels

Published: April 23 2009 03:00 | Last updated: April 23 2009 03:00

Declan Ganley almost single-handedly brought further European Union integration to a halt when he led a shrewd - some would say disingenuous - campaign against the Lisbon treaty in last year's Irish referendum.

Now, as the European parliament elections approach, Mr Ganley is trying to spin that campaign into a broad-based political movement.

He has vowed to field candidates this June in all 27 member states under the banner of Libertas, a party that calls itself a "pan-European movement dedicated to creating a new, democratic and open European Union, from the ground up".

Its target: the faceless officials running Europe from Brussels. Last month, as European heads of state gathered for yet another Brussels summit on the econ-omic crisis, Mr Ganley was putting on a show of his own just down the street.

"We don't know who these people are, what they look like," he recently told journalists. As heads of state met, he accused officials of contempt for democracy. "Do we need a thousand meetings a month? What are they meeting about?"

Libertas is particularly optimistic about its prospects in the Czech Republic. It recently recruited two members of the ODS (Civic Democratic) party who voted to bring down the Czech government in the midst of its first EU presidency. Opinion polls beg to differ.

"They don't register at all," said Simon Hix, professor of European politics at the London School of Econ-omics, who predicted that Libertas would not win a single seat in June. It is still early in the campaign, however, and Mr Ganley has already demonstrated the dangers of underestimating him.

Libertas is spicing up an election that has typically suffered from voter apathy. A recent debate between Mr Ganley and Daniel Cohn-Bendit, the Green party MEP and student hero of 1968, filled a Brussels hotel ballroom to overflowing.

Mr Ganley tried to use the encounter to cast himself as the reluctant politician - the businessman thrust into public service to rescue a foundering democracy. He also insisted he was "enthusiastic for the European idea"; he just wanted the EU to work better.

But any hopes for a substantive debate were dashed when Mr Ganley revived allegations of paedophilia based on episodes described in Mr Cohn-Bendit's memoirs, Le grand bazar . Mr CohnBendit has always rejected the claims as ridiculous.

Mr Ganley was forced to defend himself against allegations that Libertas had consorted with racists. There were also questions about his business dealings: he made a fortune in aluminium in the former Soviet Union before moving on to US defence contracting.

Yet perhaps the biggest problem facing Libertas is that, in the midst of a deep economic crisis, voters are more worried about job security than institutional reform in Brussels.

"I think that's where he falls down," says Glenis Willmott, leader of the Labour party in the European parliament. Ms Willmott predicts Libertas will help to fragment the anti-Europe vote in the UK.

The performance of fringe parties is emerging ascrucial to the election. Irish voters, having seen their econ-omic miracle crumble, now seem more inclined to seek shelter under the broad roof of Europe than when they rejected the Lisbon treaty.

Mr Ganley says Libertas is "about much more than the issues of the Lisbon treaty".

So far he has presented few specific policies beyond calling for a €10bn ($13bn, £9bn) cut in the EU's annual budget and promises to encourage small business. Libertas has yet to release a detailed manifesto.

Mr Ganley is banking on an Obama-inspired campaign website to raise money and unleash a grassroots -movement.

"Whether or not Brussels recognises Libertas is the least of my concerns," he said. "We're coming - whether they like it or not."

Longford Calling Longford calling Franco loving hard right abortion activist Chairs Libertas in Longford

I have to clear up some issues regarding the guy who claims to be Libertas Chairman in Longford
he featured on ANTI FASCIST IRELAND in 2004. It seems that James Reynolds is a complete
this just in from our reporter in Longford. He is an admirer of Franco and is a complete right wing nut job. James Reynolds is today's featured Libertas
Longford Observer said... I think you're getting your James (Jim) Reynoldses mixed up.

Firstly, Albert Reynolds's son is called Philip. Jim Reynolds, who owns the Longford Arms Hotel in Longford town is Albert Reynolds's brother...

But I don't think either is the James Reynolds involved with Libertas.

This is the James Reynolds who describes himself as Chairman of Longford Libertas (aren't we blessed?).

He is a former county chairman of the IFA (elected because no-one else went for the job and got rid of pretty rapidly) who stood at the last local elections in the Granard area and is a (former?) associate of Justin Barrett.

http://www.geocities.com/irishafa/euros.html
He was interviewed in a book a while back about his ideological wanderings from Unionism to Fine Gael to Fascism to Catholic fundamentalism (not necessarily in that order). Unfortunately I can't remember the author at the moment.

He was formerly involved with Youth Defence and was quoted in an article in Hot Press as being of the opinion that people like Nora Owen and Monica Barnes would have been shot in Franco's Spain.

A complete and utter loon.
Here
Watch out for a provocative local election campaign in Granard from ex-Blueshirt and former Longford IFA President, James Reynolds, a buddy of Justin Barrett, the No to Nice campaigner who turned out to have some interesting connections to the far right across Europe.

Reynolds made some provocative remarks to the Longford News recently and demanded that immigrants "should all be deported" going on to say that "I know these people can’t work. But if they could they wouldn’t work here." Reynolds added that "the only determination in being an Irish citizen should be that you have Irish blood" before going on to claim that "we, the Irish, will become a minority in this country." It was reassuring, therefore, to read in the same interview that Reynolds is totally opposed to racism and he told the newspaper "I condemn racism".

Barrett has gone into political hibernation since he was outed as a participant in some lurid far right rallies in Italy and German but he appears to have received a new lease of life with his comrade, Reynolds in their current base of Granard. The two are inseparable and, touchingly. They are regular attendants at Tridentine Mass in Athlone.

(The Phoenix - 23rd April 2004)

It's Official Libertas ally with the Far Right in Poland

Its official Libertas far right connections confirmed. furthermore as support for his allies has collapsed Ganley is reported to be funding the whole campaign personally. This is technically illegal in Poland but it is likely that the loophole exposed by this blogger will be utilised whereby Ganley will guarantee loans that the Polish Liberats will take out and then after the elections deliberately default on. This will allow Ganley to pay the loans off without it appearing that he technically funded the actual elections.
Slippery and lacking in Transparency Yes. Straight up and clean politics No
Polskie Radio reports today
Libetas have been trying to persuade German, Spanish and Dutch political activist that they are not in league with the far right. they had previously recruited from the ranks of the LPF. The truth is out now.

Libertas allies with fringe right wing in Poland

The Polish branch of the anti-Lisbon Treaty Libertas Party, and two small far-right parties, will draw up a common list of candidates for June’s election for the European Parliament.

Libertas Polska will be supported by the League of Polish Families (LPR) – a junior coalition partner in the 2006-2007 government, and Naprzod Polsko-Piast a small party created by former MPs from LPR and the Polish Peasant Party (PSL).

Two incumbent MEPs from the Union for Europe of the Nations Group will also strive for re-election from the list: Dariusz Grabowski and Zdzislaw Podkanski.

“We love Europe and we want a better European Union, without the sinister Treaty of Lisbon,” deputy leader of Libertas Polska, Artur Zawisza told Gazeta Wyborcza.

Leader of Liberas, Irish millionaire Declan Ganley, declared that he wants the elections to the European Parliament to be a referendum against the “anti-democratic Brussels and Treaty of Lisbon”. Ganley led the successful “No” campaign against the Lisbon Treaty in Ireland last year.

Election funding

The election campaign in Poland will be financed by Declan Ganley himself, as current support for LPR and other fringe parties on the right wing of Polish politics have little support within the country and would consequently struggle to meet the costs themselves.

Though European election law insists that campaign funds must come from within the relevant nations, Ganley will secure loans taken out in Poland, so finding a way around the rule, it was revealed late last month. Libertas Polska will then default on the loans, forcing banks to seek recompense from Ganley himself.

Vice President Artur Zawisza was quoted in the Polityka weekly, March 28, as saying: ""The most important thing for banks is to assess the creditworthiness and the collateral. I know they consulted with Mr. Declan Ganley." (jg/pg)

Libertas to launch in Rome today? Keep Rome free of Libertas fascists. Shun Ganley and the far right

Libertas have said they would launch in Rome today. As you will have seen this blogger asked people to write to Pope Benedict asking him not to meet with Ganley prior to the European elections.
Though Libertas were due to launch a manifesto today, this has been put back until May according to Ganley. However he told Polish far right politicians in February that the campaign would be based on a "few simple slogans". This runs entirely contry to the nmessage Libertas are hoping to thrust at waht they hope will be a gullible electorate and first time voters that they are attempting to target through internet social networks.
Parents beware these fascist are after your children minds.

Libertas Nein Danke calls on all Roman citizens who to express their detestation of fascism and shun Declan Ganley and his nascent Fourth Reich.

I would like to thank all the people who contacted me to say they had written to the vatican as I asked in an earlier post.

Call for Pope not to meet Declan Ganley

Call for Pope not to meet Ganley
Libertas is to its reveal candidates in Rome on 25 March, the 52nd Anniversary of the signing Treaty of Rome which established the EEC.

Catholics who oppose Ganley's right wing agenda should write to the Pope Benedict XVI and ask him not to meet Ganley as it would appear to be a political gesture. Ganley has already met Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz in Poland and last week at a meeting of the John Paul II Society he stated that he was opposed to abortion and same sex marriage. The US Defence contractor (Rivada) went on "“Christ calls us to be ambassadors for his message"

The pope should not support this US defence contractor in his bid to divide Europe. He may be a practising Catholic but he is one among millions of European Catholics. Organisations like Pax Christi actively campaign for unification and peace what do Libertas stand for? They are supporter by a far right fringe throughout Europe. European Catholics do not want wars.

Ganley is supported by people who wish to wedge a divide between Europe and its neighbours as well as the European neighbours. Libertas seek to woe Catholic voters with their stance on abortion and same sex marriage but their divisive message is not a Catholic message.
See how Libertas wish to use Catholics for their own gains
According to Libertas "‘‘The speech that Declan gave last week,” said an aide about his remarks to the Catholic groups, ‘‘that might serve him well in the west of Ireland and Poland. But we can’t have candidates saying that sort of thing in the Czech Republic or Sweden."

Say Yes to Peace Say No to Libertas.


Write to:
Pope Benedict XVI
Vatican City, Rome Italy
or Phone
Vatican Switchboard: +39.06.6982

Declan Ganley lies again and turns The Maltese Falcon into the Eagle of his Fourth Reich

When we think of Malta we may think of Humphrey Bogart and Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon. The Maltese Falcon we are presented with today is more reminiscent of the German Eagle of the Third Reich. It presented to us that the less than comely couple, Declan Ganley and Mary Gauci. Gauci, "a civil servant who recently resigned from her post as deputy leader of the right-wing Azzjoni Nazzjonal party".

In fact the Irish Times left out one word in their description of Azzjoni Nazzjonal.

They are a far right party.

The Azzoni Nazzonal or National Action's launch was reported by Malta Today under the headline "Dismal launch for Josie’s far-right party". The party was launched with invectives which were were "unambiguously anti-foreign, staunchly pro-life and pro-family, calling for greater public order, and appealing to “real Maltese” to come forward."

As well as supporting hunting and tradition one leader said "“My personal opinion is that the values of this new party should be based on the natural order and the Catholic order,”"


So Ganley has picked off the deputy leader of this group of far right nationalist and is standing her as a Libertas candidate in Malta. This adds one more xenophobic, racist extreme right winger to Ganley's collection of Europe's political scum.

To celebrate his latest accusistion Ganley in waht is becoming his typical electioneering style lied about the Maltese Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi stating that he had signed the Lisbon Treaty without reading it.
"Mr Gonzi, however, dismissed the Libertas founder’s claims as “completely untrue” and “totally absurd”, according to reports in the Maltese media"

When asked whether Libertas was right-wing, Mr Ganley said it could not be categorised into right or left, and that its candidates came from diverse backgrounds.

"We are very moderate, centrist and pro-democracy," he said.

Libertas had headed the campaign against the Lisbon Treaty, but it still labels itself as a pro-European party.

"If Brussels can ignore the democratic voice of France, the Netherlands and Ireland, how much influence can Malta have?" Mr Ganley argued, in a reference to the referendums that were won by the 'no' camp.

Ms Gauci explained that in her experience as a public officer working with the Finance Ministry, she had witnessed "sad" things which she could not disclose.

She said the scourge of illegal immigration had become a national crisis, and that Malta needed to put its foot down with the EU. However, she stopped short of giving any concrete proposals. Times of Malta

Maltese politicians should be asking how much Gauci cost Ganley. Remember Sweden? The 1 mil euro offer from Libertas to Junilistan. They should also be ready to enforce electoral laws which Ganleys appears to be completely flaunting in Ireland where he has still failed to account for the funding for his Lisbon campaign.

Irish Times

Malta Today on Libertas launch
Former AN deputy to contest EP elections with ‘Libertas’
Sunday, 22 March 2009

David Darmanin
Mary Gauci, former deputy leader of far-right political party Azzjoni Nazzjonali, has been announced leader of Libertas.eu Malta: the local branch of a newly formed pan-European party founded by Irish multi-millionaire Declan Ganley, by whose presence and eloquence Gauci was quickly upstaged at yesterday’s launch event.
A state-registered nurse by profession, Gauci will be contesting the 6 June European Parliament elections under the Libertas ticket. Ganley did not exclude the possibility of enrolling a second Maltese candidate on the new party’s list, but no there was no mention of names of other prospective candidates.
“The setting up of Libertas marks a historic moment,” Gauci said in her opening speech. “Our strength lies in that we are a pan-European party, across the 27 member states. The EU should be more democratic, and citizens of member states should remain citizens.”
Libertas was purposely set up to contest EP elections, with its primary aim being to reform European institutions so that more attention is given to individual member states, thus facilitating the pooling of sovereignty.
The political party finds its roots as a successful lobby group created to advocate a “No” vote against the Treaty of Lisbon referendum, held in Ireland last June.
Reportedly, the retired MEP Jens-Peter Bonde, a well-known Eurosceptic, was one of the main architects behind the lobby group’s upgrade to a European political party.
Among the rumoured MEP candidates running for Libertas abroad, one finds the French aristocrats Philippe de Villiers and Paul-Marie Couteaux – both associated with the Mouvement Pour la France, a far-right Eurosceptic political group advocating anti-Islamism.
But Ganley stressed that Libertas is neither a Eurosceptic party nor a far-right one. “We are pro-European and happy with the pooling of sovereignty. But European leaders have to be accountable,” he said. ”When all our candidates are announced, you will be surprised at the diversity of backgrounds in our list,” he said.
“There has been an attempt by people in Brussels to label us as Communists first, and then of having American interests, but both seemed to fail,” Ganley said in his reply to our questions.
The Irish entrepreneur, who is said to be personally worth around €300 million, is the chairman of a defence contracting company specialising in military telecommunications. It appears that a number of contracts he has with the Pentagon amount to at least $200 million.
“The public is not aware that the majority of laws are initiated in Brussels by unelected EU officials. Your parliament, along with many others, did not hold a debate before ratifying the Lisbon agenda. The signatories did not even read it. Your president will represent you as a European and will not ask you for a vote. We’ve got a problem and we need to fix it.”
Ganley said that if Malta has five seats at its disposal, across the EU Libertas will have many more.
“You need to elect a member in a party whose voice can be heard,” he said before describing other political blocs in the European parliament as “different parties sharing a photocopier and a coffee machine”.
“As we say in Ireland, ‘horses for courses’... and the Libertas horse is built for the European course,” he added. “We are going to be a voice they can’t ignore. We are not even there yet and they already hate us, and the reason for this is because they know that we are the agents of change and that we will be effective, and they’re terrified of this.”

The rise of fascism in Austria? Ganley and Libertas' Austrian supporters featured in Daily Mail article today

Accountability, transparency, No to the elites, No to nameless bureaucrats Is Joseph Goebbels and the Big Lie the inspiration for Libertas's pared down empty rhetoric? It was defined by Adolf Hitler in his 1925 autobiography Mein Kampf as a lie so "colossal" that no one would believe that someone "could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously".

The far right is on the rise in Austria according to the Daily Mail. It is noteworthy that Libertas and Declan Ganley have received support from some of the subject of todays feature article
see Libertas and its letters from Austria in the Sunday Business Post in Ireland from Sunday, May 25, 2008.

If its links to the US military are unlikely to endear Libertas to the mostly (but by no means exclusively) left-wing opponents of the Lisbon Treaty, then other links that Ganley has fostered may be more disquieting to them. Two weeks ago, he travelled to Austria to join a demonstration by a group called Rettet Österreich (Save Austria), which delivered a petition to the Irish embassy, urging Ireland to vote No to the Lisbon Treaty.

The group is currently organising a letter-writing campaign in Austria, where it supplies the names and addresses of Irish citizens to anyone who logs on to its website. The group urges people to send a letter - it supplies the text in English - to the names and addresses it provides.

The letter then warns Irish citizens that the EU is a ‘‘military alliance’’, and says that a ‘‘separate EU tax could be introduced’’. Rettet Österreich says that it is the largest group in Austria campaigning for a referendum on the treaty. The group claims that it has been ‘‘defamed’’ by media reports describing it as an extreme rightwing group. It has lodged a complaint with the state broadcaster.

What is clear, however, is that Rettet Österreich is supported by some far-right and neo-Nazi groups. At a rally held on March 14 in Vienna, members of the right-wing Freedom Party (formerly led by Jörg Haider) and the far-right National People’s Party supported the Rettet Österreich campaign, according to reports in right-wing newsletters. The Freedom Party is a rightwing party, elected to government as part of a coalition in 2000.The party has since split, and Haider has left.

The National People’s Party (NVP) is a neo-Nazi organisation, which extols race theory and campaigns for an end to EU membership for Austria. According to its website, the party is also currently running a campaign in the city of Linz against the proposed construction of a mosque - which it describes as a ‘‘pig-mosque’’ or ‘‘mosque for pigs’’.

The Freedom Party (FPO) attended the commemoration yesterday at the grave of Luftwaffe air ace Major Walter Nowotny whose anniversary also coincides with the Goebbel's inspired Kristallnacht, the ‘night of broken glass’ in 1938 when 92 people were murdered and thousands attacked across Germany as storm troopers set upon Jews. The FPO "puppetmaster" is the Nazi and former SS officer Herbert Schweige . Described to Billy Briggs of the Daily mail as the ‘Puppet Master’ of the far right, Schweiger, 85, is a legendary figure for neo-Nazis across the world.
‘Our time is coming again and soon we will have another leader like Hitler,’ he says.

Is Declan Ganley trying to fill that role ?

The Freedom Party leader Heinz Christian Strache whose party supported
materially Ganley's No campaign in Ireland through Rettet Österreich.

The Daily Mail

The far right is on the march again: the rise of fascism in Austria.


In Austria's recent general election, nearly 30 per cent of voters backed extremist right-wing parties. Live visits the birthplace of Hitler to investigate how Fascism is once again threatening to erupt across Europe.

by BILLY BRIGGS

Last updated at 11:32 PM on 14th March 2009

* Comments (0)
* Add to My Stories

Supporters of far right leader Heinz Christian Strache (pictured in the flyers held aloft by the man at the front) gather at a rally in Vienna

Supporters of far right leader Heinz Christian Strache (pictured in the flyers held aloft by the man at the front) gather at a rally in Vienna

Beneath a leaden sky the solemn, black-clad crowd moves slowly towards a modest grey headstone. At one end
of the grave, a flame casts light on the black lettering that is engraved on the marble. At the other end, an elderly soldier bends down to place flowers before standing to salute.

From all over Austria, people are here to pay their respects to their fallen hero. But the solemnity of the occasion is cut with tension. Beyond the crowd of about 300, armed police are in attendance. They keep a respectful distance but the rasping bark of Alsatians hidden in vans provides an eerie soundtrack as the crowd congregates in mist and light rain.

We’ve been warned that despite a heavy police presence journalists have often been attacked at these meetings. If trouble does come then the mob look ready to fight. There are bull-necked stewards and young men who swagger aggressively.
Heinz Christian Strache

The Freedom Party leader Heinz Christian Strache

This is a neo-Nazi gathering and in the crowd are some of Austria’s most hard-faced fascists. Among them is Gottfried Kussel, a notorious thug who was the showman of Austria’s far-right movement in the Eighties and Nineties until he was imprisoned for eight years for promoting Nazi ideology.

Today he cuts a Don Corleone figure as he stands defiantly at the graveside. His neo-Nazi acolytes make sure no one comes near him and our photographer is unceremoniously barged out of his way.

Ominous-looking men with scars across their faces whisper to each other and shake hands. These are members of Austria’s Burschenschaften, an arcane, secretive organisation best known for its fascination with fencing, an initiation ceremony that includes a duel in which the opponents cut each other’s faces, and for its strong links to the far right.

Incredibly, standing shoulder to shoulder with these hard-line Nazi sympathisers are well known Austrian politicians. At the graveside, a speech is made by Lutz Weinzinger, a leading member of Austria’s Freedom Party (FPO), who pays tribute to the fallen.

This is a gathering in memory of an Austrian-born Nazi fighter pilot, who during WWII shot down 258 planes, 255 of them Russian. Such was Major Walter Nowotny’s standing at the time of his death in 1944 that the Nazi Party awarded him a grave of honour in Vienna’s largest cemetery, close to the musical legends Mozart, Brahms and Strauss.

But in 2005 that honour was revoked and his body moved to lie in an area of public graves. The decision infuriated the far right and made their annual pilgrimage an even greater event.

Today, the anniversary of Nowotny’s death, also coincides with Kristallnacht, the ‘night of broken glass’ in 1938 when 92 people were murdered and thousands attacked across Germany as stormtroopers set upon Jews in an outpouring of Nazi violence.

Some 70 years on from that infamous pogrom, the world faces a similar financial crisis to the one that precipitated the rise of Hitler and, in chilling echoes of Thirties Europe, support for far-right groups is exploding. Hitler’s birthplace has become the focus for neo-Nazis across the world.

And so I have come to Austria to investigate how Fascism and extremism are moving, unchecked, into the forefront of its society.

Last September, Austria’s far right gained massive political influence in an election that saw the FPO along with another far right party – Alliance For The Future (BZO) – gain 29 per cent of the vote, the same share as Austria’s main party, the Social Democrats. The election stirred up terrifying memories of the rise of the Nazi Party in the Thirties.

And just as the Nazis gained power on the back of extreme nationalism and virulent anti-Semitism, the recent unprecedented gains in Austria were made on a platform of fear about immigration and the perceived threat of Islam. FPO leader Heinz Christian Strache, for example, described women in Islamic dress as ‘female ninjas’.

Emboldened by the new power in parliament, neo-Nazi thugs have desecrated Muslim graves. Recently, in Hitler’s home town of Braunau, a swastika flag was publicly unveiled.
Austrian far right leader Heinz Christian Strache addresses a rally

Austrian far right leader Heinz Christian Strache addresses a rally

The FPO wants to legalise Nazi symbols, while its firebrand leader has been accused of having links to far right extremists.

After the FPO’s election victory, Nick Griffin, leader of the British Nationalist Party (BNP), sent a personal message to Strache.

‘We in Britain are impressed to see that you have been able to combine principled nationalism with electoral success. We are sure that this gives you a good springboard for the European elections and we hope very much that we will be able to join you in a successful nationalist block in Brussels next year.’

The message followed on from a secret meeting last May in which a high-ranking FPO politician paid a visit to London for a meeting with Griffin.

The relationship between the FPO and the BNP becomes more worrying as I learn of the strong links between Austria’s political party and hard-line Nazis.
Former Waffen SS officer and unrepentant Nazi Herbert Schweiger

Former Waffen SS officer and unrepentant Nazi Herbert Schweiger

Herbert Schweiger makes no attempt to hide his Nazi views. At his home in the Austrian mountains, the former SS officer gazes out of a window to a view of a misty alpine valley. Described to me as the ‘Puppet Master’ of the far right, Schweiger, 85, is a legendary figure for neo-Nazis across the world.

‘Our time is coming again and soon we will have another leader like Hitler,’ he says.

Still remarkably sharp-minded, Schweiger was a lieutenant in the infamous Waffen SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler, an elite unit originally formed before WWII to act as the Führer’s personal bodyguards.

This is his first interview for four years and the first he has ever given to a journalist from outside Austria. It happens a few weeks before he is due to appear in court charged with promoting neo-Nazi ideology.

It will be the fifth time he has stood trial for breaking a law, the Verbotsgesetz, enacted in 1947 to halt the spread of fascist ideology. He has been found guilty twice and acquitted twice. It quickly becomes apparent that little has changed in Schweiger’s mindset since his Third Reich days.

‘The Jew on Wall Street is responsible for the world’s current economic crisis. It is the same now as in 1929 when 90 per cent of money was in the hands of the Jew. Hitler had the right solutions then,’ he says, invoking the language of Goebbels.

The room is filled with mementos from his past and indicators of his sickening beliefs. His bookshelf is a library of loathing. I spot a book by controversial British Holocaust denier David Irving and one on the ‘myth of Auschwitz’. On a shelf hangs a pennant from the SS Death’s Head unit that ran Hitler’s concentration camps. Such memorabilia is banned in Austria but Schweiger defiantly displays his Nazi possessions.

If Schweiger was an old Nazi living out his final days in this remote spot, it might be possible to shrug him off as a now harmless man living in his past. But Schweiger has no intention of keeping quiet.

‘My job is to educate the fundamentals of Nazism. I travel regularly in Austria and Germany speaking to young members of our different groups,’ he says.

Schweiger’s lectures are full of hate and prejudice. He refers to Jews as ‘intellectual nomads’ and says poor Africans should be allowed to starve.

‘The black man only thinks in the present and when his belly is full he does not think of the future,’ he says. ‘They reproduce en masse even when they have no food, so supporting Africans is suicide for the white race.

‘It is not nation against nation now but race against race. It is a question of survival that Europe unites against the rise of Asia. There is an unstoppable war between the white and yellow races. In England and Scotland there is very strong racial potential.
Our time is coming again and soon we will have another leader like Hitler

‘Of course I am a racist, but I am a scientific racist,’ he adds, as if this is a justification.

Schweiger’s raison d’être is politics. He was a founding member of three political parties in Austria – the VDU, the banned NDP and the FPO. He has given his support to the current leader of the FPO.

‘Strache is doing the right thing by fighting the foreigner,’ says Schweiger.

He is now in close contact with the Kameradschaften, underground cells of hardcore neo-Nazis across Austria and Germany who, over the past three years, have started to infiltrate political parties such as the FPO.

His belief that the bullet and the ballot box go hand in hand goes back to 1961, when he helped to train a terrorist movement fighting for the reunification of Austria and South Tyrol.

‘I was an explosives expert in the SS so I trained Burschenschaften how to make bombs. We used the hotel my wife and I owned as a training camp,’ he says. The hotel he refers to is 50 yards from his home.

Thirty people in Italy were murdered during the campaign. One of the men convicted for the atrocities, Norbert Burger, later formed the now-banned neo-Nazi NDP party with Schweiger.

Schweiger’s involvement earned him his first spell in custody in 1962 but he was acquitted.
A gathering of the Burschenschaften, a secretive nationalist group with far-right tendencies

A gathering of the Burschenschaften, a secretive nationalist group with far-right tendencies

At Vienna’s Documentation Centre of Austrian Resistance (DOW), I speak to Heribert Schiedel, who monitors neo-Nazi activity. He tells me that the glue between people like Schweiger and the politicians are the Burschenschaften fraternities. Schiedel draws two circles and explains.

‘In the circle on the left you have legal parties such as the FPO. In the circle on the right you have illegal groups. Two distinct groupings who pretend they are separate.’

He draws another circle linking the two together. ‘This circle links the legal and illegal. This signifies the Burschenschaften. They have long been associated with Fascism and have a history of terrorism. Adolf Eichmann, Rudolf Hess and Heinrich Himmler were Burschenschaften – as are prominent members of the FPO in parliament.’

There are Burschenschaften groups all over Austria and 18 in the capital alone. Their activities range from quaint to disturbing.

At the University of Vienna, members of the Burschenschaften come to pay homage to a statue called the Siegfriedskopf (the Head of Siegfried, a warrior from German mythology). Their ritual takes place every Wednesday.
The university authorities wanted to remove the statue, but the government insisted it should stay as it is a protected monument. Instead, the piece was relocated to the courtyard.

Today, the Burschenschaften have been prevented from entering the courtyard and at the main entrance police stand guard as they hand out leaflets. Dressed in traditional uniforms, the Burschenschaften resemble colourful bandsmen and are a far cry from the shaven-headed thugs normally associated with Fascism.

But the groups have a 200-year-old history steeped in patriotism and loyalty to a German state. In 2005, Olympia, one of the most extreme Burschenschaften fraternities, invited David Irving to Austria.

As other students gather, there is tension in the air. One girl whispers that this group recently attacked students protesting outside the Austrian Parliament against the FPO.

A young student with round glasses and a scar on his left cheek, wearing the purple colours of Olympia, is handing out leaflets. Roland denies being a neo-Nazi but he quickly starts relaying his fiercely nationalist views.
Gottfried Kussel (second from right) among the gathering at the grave of WWII Nazi pilot Walter Nowotny

Gottfried Kussel (second from right) among the gathering at the grave of WWII Nazi pilot Walter Nowotny

‘The anti-fascists are the new fascists,’ he says. ‘We are not allowed to tell the truth about how foreigners are a threat.’

The truth, according to Roland, is that Muslims, immigrants and America are destroying his way of life.

‘We are German-Austrians. We want a community here based on German nationalism,’ he adds. ‘We must fight to save our heritage and culture.’

The Burschenschaften hold regular, secretive meetings in cellar bars around Vienna. Journalists are not usually admitted, but I manage to persuade a group of Burschenschaften students to let me see their traditions. Once inside, I find myself in a bar filled with 200 men sitting at long tables drinking steins of Austrian beer.

The Burschenschaften are resplendent in the colours of their fraternities. Old and young, they sport sashes in the black, red and gold of the German flag, and as the beer flows in this neo-Gothic building, chatter fills the room and cigarette smoke rises in plumes up to chandeliers hung from a vaulted ceiling.

‘Prost!’ the man sitting to my right toasts loudly. His name is Christian. He is no neo-Nazi thug, but instead a psychology student. His white peaked cap signifies that he is a member of a Burschenschaften group called Gothia.
Most of the men at this table are Gothia, including the man sitting opposite who ordered the beer. He glares at me again. He has long scars on both sides of his face that run from his cheekbones down to the edges of his mouth, and when he sucks on his cigarette he reminds me of the Joker from Batman. Christian has a dozen wounds from fencing, including five on his left cheek.

‘It is a badge of honour to duel,’ he says proudly, before explaining that this is an annual event and that one of tonight’s speeches will be on the ‘threat of Islam to Europe’.

Suddenly, everyone at our table stands amazed as FPO leader Heinz Christian Strache enters.

He is wearing a royal blue hat – signifying his membership of the Vandalia Burschenschaften – and after shaking hands with each of us he sits at the far end of the table. Shortly afterwards I’m asked to leave.

Although the Burschenschaften claims to be politically neutral, FPO flyers had been placed in front of each guest and it was clear this event was a political rally in support of the FPO – an event that would culminate with these Austrians, including a leading politician, singing the German national anthem.

After my encounter with the leader of the FPO among the Burschenschaften, I contact Strache’s press office to question his membership of an organisation linked to far right extremism, and ask why the FPO wishes to revoke the Verbotsgesetz (the law banning Nazi ideology).

In a response by email, Mr Strache replied that the FPO wants to revoke the Verbotsgesetz because it believes in freedom of speech. He denied having any links to neo-Nazi groups and says he is proud to be a member of the Burschenschaften.

‘The Burschenschaften was founded during the wars against Napoleon Bonaparte in the beginning of the 19th century. These are the historical origins I am proud of,’ he wrote.

Back at Nowotny’s graveside I think of the Puppet Master in his mountain home. How can a former Nazi still hold so much political sway? The Burschenschaften are here, too.

There are no ‘sieg heils’ and no swastikas for the cameras, but it’s clear that Fascism is back. These are not thugs merely intent on racial violence, who are easily locked up. These are intellectuals and politicians whose move to the forefront of society is far more insidious.

Through the political influence of the FPO it is entirely possible that the Verbotsgesetz could be revoked – and if that happens swastikas could once again be seen on Austria’s streets.

The ideas and racial hatred that I have heard over my two weeks in Austria are just as threatening and just as sickening as any I have ever heard. And they are a lot more sinister because they are spoken with the veneer of respectability.

The open defiance of these men honouring their Nazi ‘war hero’, and the support they are gaining in these troubled economic times, should be setting off alarm bells in Europe and the rest of the world.