Golden Dawn spokesman compares leader of ultra-right party to Erdogan
Golden Dawn’s spokesman Ilias Kasidiaris has compared the leader of the neofascist party, Nikos Michaloliakos, who is in pre-trial custody on charges of setting up a criminal organization, to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, saying that the GD leader will take revenge on his persecutors as Erdogan did after his release from prison in 1998.
“He was jailed for a year but then came out and put his rivals away for life,» Kasidiaris said during a program on Golden Dawn’s web television station aired late on Thursday. He was referring to Erdogan’s conviction for inciting religious hatred by reciting a poem in public, while he was mayor of Istanbul, that compared minarets to bayonets and the faithful of Islam to an army.
Last month, before a government crackdown on Golden Dawn, MPs of the ultra-right party caused turmoil in Parliament, labeling Muslim MPs from northeastern Greece “Turkish-speaking agents” and saying that GD still regards Istanbul as the Greek capital.
