Deal with the Golden Dawn say anti-fascists

By New Worker

correspondent

NEARLY 300 anti-fascist protesters assembled last Saturday outside the Greek Embassy in Holland Park, London to demand that the Greek government take measures to deal with the increasingly violent neo-Nazi party known as the Golden Dawn.

This follows the murder last week of Pavlos Fyssas, a young anti-fascist Greek musician and a few days before that a violent attack on members of the KKE Greek Communist Party.

The young communists were putting up anti-Golden dawn posters when one of the neo-Nazi movement’s “punishment squads” descended on them, leaving them with severe head injuries some which are life threatening.

Greek police were reported to be nearby when the murder of Pavlos Fyssas happened but failed to prevent the stabbing.

There have been international calls for the banning of the Golden Dawn but the Greek police and government have been dragging their heels.

Some suspect the government feels it may soon need the support of the 18 votes of Golden Dawn MPs to support them in office.

The protest was called by the Greek broad left popular movement Syriza and was supported by Unite Against Fascism, Searchlight and other anti-fascists.

London-based members of the KKE also attended with a banner and a loud speaker, emphasising that fascism is a product of capitalism, which is the root of the problem.

Certainly the Golden Dawn has thrived as the extreme austerity imposed on Greece by the European Union has opened ethnic divisions in Greece.

Police tried to keep the protesters to the pavement opposite the embassy in Holland Park but they soon spilled over and filled the pavement on both sides of the road.

The diplomatic protection police were quite happy as long as no one attempted to attack the embassy – and it was quite clear that, while noisy, this was a peaceful protest.

Later efforts by police to shepherd the protesters back across the road simply resulted in the road itself filling up with protesters as more and more arrived.

There were two arrests as some protesters resisted the police efforts to move them across the road.