Stop NS glorification!

8. Dezember 2019

In the past, the FIR showed that it is able as federation of the former resistance fighters and younger anti-fascists to intervene in the current historical-political discourse and to stand up for anti-fascism and humanity. As an international umbrella organization, it is in addition their noblest task to promote the solidarity among the member organizations.

In order to tie the volume of the internationalism still more closely and to practice practical solidarity the FIR is to decide the following:

  1. FIR calls all member organizations to support the anti-fascist protests against these Nazi marches.
  2. FIR will to write and dispatch public protest notes to the respective national governments and local mayors to all marches mentioned.
  3. Together, we will send delegations to the support of the anti-fascists, particularly to Budapest, Sofia and Bleiburg.

Reasons for the decision

The memory of the resistance against fascism and the liberation is the common basis of the FIR. 2020, we celebrate the 75th anniversary of the liberation in many places in Europe. While the member organizations of the member federations of the FIR stand for the antifascist inheritance, fascist organizations like the Blood & Honour network, try to rewrite the history and to reinterpret the fascist defeat in victories.

Fascist groups and networks organize events and demonstrations to glorify fascism and its worst representatives. These events serve on the one hand to network old and new fascists and as self-affirmation of the Nazi scene internally, on the other hand they are the starting point for historical revisionist efforts throughout Europe. Occasionally, the boundaries between these activities of the extreme right and government positions are blurred.

Following is an overview of the largest and most important regular events of this kind.

Budapest: Every year in February Nazis from all over Europe come together in Budapest and take part in the commemoration and demonstration of Blood&Honour Hungary. More than one thousand Neo-Nazis march unhindered during the so-called “Day of Honor” in February, while the anti-fascist protest and progressive civil society are exposed to state repression and marginalization.

Sofia: Also in February, the honoring of the fanatical anti-Semite General Hristo Lukov takes place in Sofia since some years. Since his death on 13 February 1943, he has been regarded as a symbolic figure and martyr of Bulgarian fascists. Largely ignored by the media, over a thousand neo-Nazis from all over Europe take part in the glorification of the collaborator and anti-Semite. With a rally in front of the Bulgarian embassy in Berlin in 2019, solidarity with Bulgarian anti-fascists and media attention on Bulgarian television could be generated for the first time.

Riga: Every year on 16 March, the Baltic variant of such Nazi glorification takes place in Riga. The official purpose of this “Day of the Legionnaires” is to commemorate a battle won by Latvian SS units on Lake Ladoga over the Red Army in 1944. In cooperation with the local church, Viktor Arajs and other fascist butchers are blessed and honored. Only a small minority of Latvian Jews and Russian-speaking people organize protests. The year 2014 showed how important solidarity is, in which it succeeded in exerting pressure on the Latvian government by the participation of the FIR, so that this was forced to dissociate itself from the event. In the following years it succeeded repeatedly to arouse media attention by common protests before diplomatic representations of Latvia in several countries and so to practice solidarity with the Latvian anti-fascists* inside.

Bleiburg/ Pliberk: The biggest fascist event is the commemoration of Ustaša fighters in Bleiburg/ Pliberk. Up to 30,000 neo-Nazis and Croatian nationalists meet here on the Loibach field. They are reminiscent of the so-called “Massacre of Bleiburg”, also supported by parts of the Catholic Church. The central element of this May meeting is the trivialization of war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by the Ustaša fighters and other allies of Nazi Germany.

Berlin: For some years, neo-Nazis in Germany have been trying again to establish demonstrations with a clear reference to historical fascism. In the years 2017 and 2018, for example, there were demonstrations for Hitler’s deputy Rudolf Hess in Berlin with about 1000 participants from the NPD environment. The motto of these Hess marches was “I regret nothing”. This is a saying of Rudolf Hess during the Nuremberg Trials. He glorified in that way industrial mass extermination and war of aggression. Not surprisingly, the marches in Berlin always took place with the participation of internationally arrived neo-Nazis.