ABTTF President: “The court’s decision to release Nikolaos Michaloliakos, the leader of the criminal organisation Golden Dawn, despite the prosecutor’s objection and no remorse for what I did, is a situation that hurts the public conscience and is alarming and unacceptable for our country Greece.’’
The racist Golden Dawn leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos, whose organisation was labelled as a criminal organisation by the court in 2020, was released on parole from prison by court decision. Michaloliakos, who was sentenced to 13 years and 6 months in prison for leading a criminal organisation that carried out bloody actions, will be released with restrictive measures.
According to the court decision, Michaloliakos, who cannot go outside the borders of the Attica region, will not be able to meet with other defendants convicted in the same case.
It was stated that although the prosecutor expressed the opinion that Michaloliakos should continue to be detained, the judges decided to release him under restrictive measures.
In the case concluded in 2020, the court found Golden Dawn leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos and its members Ilias Kasidiaris, Ioannis Lagos, George Germenis, Ilias Panagiotaros, Panagiotis Iliopoulos, and Nikos Papas guilty of running a criminal organisation, and the other eighteen defendants were found guilty of being members of a criminal organisation.
“The court’s decision to release Nikolaos Michaloliakos, the leader of the criminal organisation Golden Dawn, despite the prosecutor’s objection and no remorse for what I did, is a situation that hurts the public conscience and is alarming and unacceptable for our country Greece. The criminal organisation Golden Dawn has directly targeted our community and made verbal and physical attacks many times in the recent past. Before the conference we, as ABTTF, held in the European Parliament in Brussels in March 2016, MEPs from the then Golden Dawn Party stormed the hall and made threats and insults. Considered together with the recent serious threats to the rule of law in our country, the release of Michaloliakos has undoubtedly once again deeply shaken the public’s trust in justice and completely contradicts the court decision in 2020”, said Halit Habip Oğlu, President of the Federation of Western Thrace Turks in Europe (ABTTF).
*Image: www.anadoluimages.com
