Greek neo-Nazi leader Michaloliakos returns to jail for failing to show remorse for past acts

Nikos Michaloliakos, the former leader of the banned neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, is set to return to prison after the Greek judicial council overturned his parole release on Monday for failing to show remorse for his past actions or a change in his ideology.

The judicial council of the Lamia Court of Appeals in the central town of Lamia reconsidered the public prosecutor's recommendations, which argued that Michaloliakos demonstrated no remorse for his actions or a change in his ideology, and overturned his release on conditional parole.

On May 2, the Misdemeanor Court Judges Council in Lamia overruled the public prosecutor's recommendations and ordered Michaloliakos' released on conditional parole after the Athens Court of Appeals convicted him in 2020 of running a criminal organization and sentenced him to 13 years in prison.

However, the public prosecutor's arguments were accepted in Monday's proceedings, which established that Michaloliakos had written numerous articles online during his parole period praising neo-Nazi practices and demonstrating no change in his ideology, making him naive to commit similar acts again.He will be rearrested following the court decision, but there are currently no details about his detention until 1200GMT.

Michaloliakos and the other senior members of the group, Christos Pappas, Ilias Kasidiaris, Ioannis Lagos, Giorgos Germenis, and Ilias Panagiotaros, were charged with forming and running a criminal organization under the guise of a political party.

Under Michaloliakos' leadership, Golden Dawn and its members orchestrated a series of violent crimes, including an attack and murder of the leftist rapper Pavlos Fyssas in 2013.

Michaloliakos is a former member of the nationalist youth organization Ethniki Politiki Enosis (National Political Union), which was led by former military dictator Georgios Papadopoulos, who ruled the country from 1967 to 1974.

- Rise and fall

The Golden Dawn was formed in 1980 but was not registered as a political party until 1993.

Its political breakthrough came in the 2012 elections when it received around 6.92% of the votes, making it Greece's fifth-largest political group and enabling it to enter the parliament for the first time.

It won three seats in the European Parliament after winning 9.4% of the votes in the 2014 European elections.

However, it was unable to win any seats in 2019, leaving it out of the parliament.

Its rise coincided with the 2008 European economic crisis that saw Greece suffer tremendous recession, job losses, and budget cuts.

Athens eventually needed a bailout from its European Union partners and strict austerity measures.