Booze Hound addresses Italian Fascists

Nick Griffin's European gravy train took him from his Nazi shindig in Stockholm yesterday afternoon on to Rome last night, where he addressed a meeting of the fascist Italian group Forza Nuova (New Force). Griffin would've been most relived to leave Stockholm as it appears that thousands of people turned out to protest against it.

"New Force" are actually anything but new. It's the party of Griffin's old friend Roberto Fiore, a convicted terrorist and long time inspiration to the extreme far-right fringe in this country.

Fiore helped destroy the old National Front here as his young disciples Nick Griffin and Patrick Harrington went and ended up on begging missions to Colonel Gaddafi in Tripoli and trying to play ideological footsie with Irish Republicans instead of paying enough attention to their much maligned and shrinking British membership.

One of the chief architects of Griffin's old "Poltical Soldiers" Drerek Holland, who wrote the seminal work that led to the NF's destruction 'The Political Soldier' was also on the invite list, so it would have been a real old get- together for the people who did so much fantastic damage to British fascism in the 1980's.

Fiore's party supports the ideas of Julius Evola, an Italian born in 1898 who was heavily into mysticism, deviancy and of course, Jew hating. Evola died in 1974, no doubt happy that he got to see a lot of his favourite things unleash themselves across Europe during his life.

He would probably have enjoyed how debauched his British followers became in his name too had he lived long enough to see it.

While Griffin was in Rome, he helped himself to plenty of that hospitality for which he has become notorious since taking over the BNP. As his party's membership fees increase, so it appears does Griffin's bourgeois lifestyle and tastes.

Griffin had a little too much to drink while in Rome and reports this morning that he is suffering "the worst hangover of my life". What didn't help was his luggage not joining him there. I'm pleased to report that Griffin's luggage went to Ethiopia instead.

While Old Nick was downing large amounts of "beer, grappa & absynthe" in Rome, he at least had the decency to ring his members at the party's awful beanfeast in Jarrow, where the few members who bothered to turn up to listen to his drunken rambling were bemused to find Adam Walker the BNP's "party manager", walking around in a karate outfit.

Griffin's new best friend forever Simon Darby did not get an invite to Rome. Last time he was there he was Nazi saluted by Italian admirers which was just another of the nails that went into the BNP's electoral coffin at the time.

While the BNP's very own "Rome" burns, isn't it great to see their leader has gone to the real Rome to get himself pissed and incoherent while mixing with the very sort of policies and people that helped him destroy the old NF.





Hope not Hate

Griffin tries to buy time with resignation ploy

Under pressure from a series of revelations by the British National Party’s former webmaster Simon Bennett and calls for new leadership by party activists and organisers stung by their disastrous election results, Nick Griffin has announced that he will step down as leader “by the end of 2013”.

His declaration, made to a meeting of the party’s Advisory Council and key organisers on 22 May, is unlikely to satisfy those who have been contributing to Bennett’s website trying to win support for a leadership challenge this year. Many will consider that three and a half years is too long for the party to stagnate under Griffin, and will be all too well aware of Griffin’s past form at wriggling out of awkward situations and commitments.

According to a statement on the BNP website, Griffin intends to concentrate on getting re-elected to the European Parliament in 2014. He then intends “to help the other European nationalist parties to achieve the level of sophistication which the BNP has been able to build up, because a victory for any one of these parties is a victory to all of us”.

These “European nationalist parties” are likely to include some of Europe’s most hardline racist and fascist organisations. Griffin and his fellow BNP MEP Andrew Brons are members of the Alliance of European National Movements, a far-right group in the European Parliament formed in Budapest last October. Its other members are the three MEPs from Hungary’s fascist Jobbik party and the three French National Front MEPs.

The group is also supported by Italy’s Fiamma Tricolore, the Belgian National Front and the Swedish National Democrats, none of which have MEPs.

Griffin’s announcement shows that he remains more an internationalist fascist than a British nationalist, true to the politics he learned from his mentor, the convicted Italian terrorist Roberto Fiore. No doubt he has also become accustomed to the European Parliament’s generous salary and expenses regime.

Between now and 2013, Griffin intends to concentrate on “putting into place of the last ‘building blocks’ of the BNP’s administrative and political machine”. This is a more buoyant description than in his e-newsletters since the election in which he said that the party’s “underdeveloped elections department” had to be overhauled and restructured.

Griffin would then make way for “a younger person who does not have any baggage which can be used against the party,” a recognition that his presence is a liability for the party. Finding a person without “baggage”, who “will be able to drive support up to where it [the BNP] can be a serious contender for power” may be hard. Until now, any person fitting that description has left the party either in one of Griffin’s “purges” or because they have discovered that the party is not what they expected it to be.

The extended Advisory Council meeting also heard “consultant” Jim Dowson claim that “contrary to internet rumour-mongers”, the BNP owns the “Truth Truck” advertising vehicle for which Dowson raised a reported £80,000 or more in 2008. This was apparently confirmed in person by Jennie Noble, “the BNP treasurer who paid for the vehicle”.

If that is true then why did the BNP’s solicitors tell bailiffs trying to seize the vehicle to meet a debt that it was owned by an unconnected third party?

Dowson also stated that he did not take a commission on transactions through the BNP’s Belfast call centre. However he was silent on whether his call centre staff, who include friends and relations of Dowson and Griffin, were paid commission on party memberships and other sales, as evidenced by Bennett.

He did however reveal that he, under the guise of his “Midas Consultancy” business, was paid £165,000 for raising £2.6 million in donations for the party since January 2008.

Whether Dowson really has raised £2.6 million cannot be verified at present. The 2008 accounts showed an increase in donations of £662,000 over 2007, but the 2009 accounts will not be available until the end of July, provided the party manages to submit them on time. The BNP claimed to have raised over £500,000 for its European election campaign and there have been some fundraising appeals since then, such as to fight the legal action by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) over the BNP’s “whites only” membership criterion, but central party fundraising for this year’s elections seemed to have stalled. Much of the money to pay for general election deposits and leaflets was raised locally by party branches, with no input from Dowson.

Even if Dowson has raised a seven-figure sum, BNP members might raise eyebrows at the amount paid to a consultant who is always keen to point out that he is not a party member.

The meeting was told that BNP membership now stands at “just under 14,000 … increasing by several hundred every month” and that the rate at which BNP members fail to renew has decreased from over 70% to less 20%, now doubt testament to the harassment several members have reported from Dowson’s call centre – people rejoin just to stop the constant phone calls. The BNP has past form in exaggerating its membership and we can only wait to see how these claims compare with the audited figures in the party’s 2009 and 2010 accounts.

Missing from the announcements was any response to the numerous members who are calling for greater transparency in the BNP’s finances.

Griffin concluded by claiming that the party had “emerged from the meeting re-energised and ready for the ongoing struggle to save our nation from destruction at the hands of the old parties”, which is a rather creative way of describing the widespread disillusionment following the twin blows of the party’s capitulation over admitting “non-white” members and its rout in the general and local elections.

Hope not hate

Twenty-eight arrests at Spanish event attended by BNP's Griffin

Spanish police Saturday detained 28 members of a far-right party who tried to disrupt an event held by a rival far-right group attended by British National Party leader Nick Griffin at a Madrid hotel.

The detained are all members of Spain's far-right Patriotic Socialist Movement and they were arrested after they attacked doormen at the hotel who were trying to prevent them from entering, a police spokesman said. Four people were lightly injured in the scuffle but did not require medical care, he added.

The National Democracy Party which staged the event said it had requested police protection because of fears that far-left groups might try to disrupt it as has happened in the past.

It was not immediately clear why members of the Patriotic Socialist Movement tried to disrupt the event, which featured in addition to Griffin, the leader of Italian far-right party Forza Nuova, Roberto Fiore, and National Democracy leader Manuel Canduela.

In June Griffin and another BNP member won seats in the European Parliament elections, a first for the party which advocates the voluntary repatriation of immigrants. It has no seats in the national parliament.

AFP

The BNP and terrorism

This article was submitted by one of our readers, Roddy Newman. We welcome any contributions from our supporters (as long as those contributions conform to the law and are in reasonably good taste). Please send your articles to us via email.

After 9/11, BNP leader Nick Griffin started moralising about Islamist terrorism, and pretended that the BNP was a mainstream political party like the big 3 parties, UKIP, and the Greens, but as I will explain in this article, the BNP has had links to fascist terrorists, while the five other parties have not. Moreover, as I will also explain in this article, Nick Griffin supported Iranian dictator Ayatollah Khomeini's terrorist regime during his period in the International Third Position group, who saw Khomeini's Iran, and Libyan dictator Colonel Gadaffi's terrorist regime, as a "Third Way" which was not "Jewish-controlled capitalism", or "Jewish-controlled communism".

The most notorious BNP linked former terrorist, is of course the London nail bomber, David Copeland, whose 3 bombs killed 3 and injured 139. Copeland had been a member of the BNP before he carried out his bombings, and he openly said that his bombs were designed to create a race war which would encourage white British people to vote BNP (one bomb went off in the primarily African-Caribbean Brixton area, and one in the primarily Asian Brick Lane area). The third went off in a Soho gay bar. See the June 30, 2000 BBC News online article, "Profile: Copeland the killer", to learn more about Copeland and his bombings.

Another BBC News online article, "Ex-BNP man jailed over chemicals" (July 31, 2007), discussed a second BNP former terrorist, Robert Cottage [pictured left], who stored bomb-making chemicals at his home, because he expected that immigration would lead to a civil war. A YouTube film, "BNP terrorist Robert Cottage", which is a clip from a Sky News report about his bomb-making hoard, mentions his involvement with the BNP, for whom he stood as a local election candidate 3 times.

A third BNP former terrorist, former BNP Propaganda Officer and Group Development Officer Tony Lecomber, who was taking a nail bomb to the headquarters of a left wing group when it went off in his car, was discussed in an article in "Searchlight", which is Britain's leading anti-fascist magazine, "Sacked terrorist ran BNP election campaign" (September 2006), and in a YouTube film, "BNP nail-bomber Tony Lecomber", which is a clip from a BBC "Panorama" documentary, "Under the Skin", which was originally broadcast on November 25, 2000.

The "Searchlight" magazine, which all 3 of the big political parties have asked for advice on how to defeat BNP candidates in elections, have discussed a number of other BNP former terrorists in their articles. In their November 2005 article, "Right-wing terrorism still alive and plotting", you can read about David Tovey, a BNP member who was caught with military plastic explosive, and remote control devices to set it off, and in March 2007's "AWB terrorist finds home in the BNP", you can read about Lambertus Nieuwhof, a white South African former terrorist who has joined the BNP, and who has created a number of its websites - for example, the website of the BNP's Barking and Dagenham branch, and the website of its Solidarity trades union.

As a March 31, 2007 article in "The Guardian" ("BNP activist took part in terror campaign") revealed, Nieuwhof planted a 25 kg bomb in a South African multiracial school, which thankfully failed to explode.

If Nieuwhof was a non-white, South African Islamist former terrorist, rather than a white South African former terrorist, there would no doubt have been critical stories in various national newspapers about his presence in Britain, but so far, only "The Guardian", and "The Independent" ("Johann Hari: The looming threat of terror that comes from the far right", October 14, 2009) have written about him.

Johann Hari's article, which was reprinted in "The Belfast Telegraph" under a slightly different title ("Johann Hari: UK faces looming threat of terror from 'neo-Nazis' out to kill black people, Jews and gays"), perhaps because that city is much more concerned about white terrorists than the mainland UK is, for obvious reasons, discusses several British fascist former terrorists, including David Copeland and Tony Lecomber.

The YouTube video "Lambertus Nieuwhof and the Afrikaner Resistance Movement", is a short clip from "His Big White Self", a 2006 Nick Broomfield TV documentary about the Afrikaaner Resistance Movement white South African terrorist group, who, as the film explains, set off about 120 bombs in the 1992 to 1994 period, to try to stop the transition to black majority rule. Broomfield made another TV documentary about the same terrorist group in 1991, "The Leader, His Driver, and the Driver's Wife". Both of the documentaries have now been released on DVD.

On a "Searchlight" HOPE not hate webpage, "The real BNP: The terrorist links", you can read about yet another BNP related former terrorist, BNP supporter Allen Boyce, who was given a 2 year suspended jail sentence after he passed bomb making instructions to a BNP activist, Terry Collins.

As I will now explain, even Nick Griffin himself has past terrorist links, as he is linked to an Italian fascist former terrorist who was convicted in absentia for being a member of an Italian fascist terrorist group. As I will now explain as well, Griffin also once backed 2 regimes which funded terrorist groups, and was allegedly once a "close ally" of a pro-terrorism American fascist party leader.

The Italian fascist former terrorist who Griffin is linked to, is Roberto Fiore, who fled Italy and made his home in Britain after the August 2, 1980 Bologna train station bombing (which killed 85, and injured more than 200), because his fascist terrorist group, the Armed Revolutionary Nuclei, were responsible for what is known in Italy as "The Bologna massacre". See 3 online articles, "Italy:Terror on the Right" ("New York Review of Books", January 22, 1981, Volume 27, Numbers 21 and 22), "Roberto Fiore: from terrorist to entrepreneur...and back again" ("Searchlight", July 1998), and the "Searchlight" HOPE not hate website's "Nick Griffin, BNP leader" (December 2008) to learn more about Fiore, the Armed Revoloutionary Nuclei, and the Bologna massacre.

Most people would no doubt assume that Nick Griffin, who moralises about Islamist terrorism, would have had nothing to do with a former terrorist like Fiore when he fled to Britain, but of course if you did assume that, you would be wrong, because Griffin has in the past said one thing to the general public, and a different thing to his own people. Griffin tells the general public that the BNP is now a moderate mainstream political party, but in a YouTube film of a Griffin speech, which has been posted under the title "BNP MEP Nick Griffin + KKK Terrorist", Griffin tells an American far right audience that he is merely repackaging his unchanged far right ideas to make them more acceptable to the British general public.

It is thus not surprising that Fiore is the political mentor and friend of Griffin, as a "Searchlight" article, "Nick Griffin political extremist and veteran splitter" (February 2008) pointed out, and that Fiore has financially supported Griffin, as a second "Searchlight" article, "BNP deputy leader addresses international fascist rally" (April 5, 2009) explained. It is thus also not surprising that Griffin used to be Fiore's business partner, as a third "Searchlight" article, "No beer, no bands, no fun" (September 2009) revealed, that Griffin and Fiore once shared a flat together, as a February 29, 2008 article in "The Guardian" ("Language school run by Italian fascist leader") stated, and that Fiore spoke at the BNP's Red, White and Blue Festival in August 2009, as an August 16 story in "The Times", "Convicted Italian fascist Roberto Fiore addresses BNP followers in Derbyshire" noted. Nor is it surprising that in a YouTube video which has been posted under the title "Nick Griffin and Christianity (BNP)", you can hear Griffin praising Fiore as "charismatic" and "magnetic".

If you know about the dirty secrets of the Italian fascist scene which the "charismatic" and "magnetic" Fiore emerged from, then you will also know that those dirty secrets make it extremely hypocritical for the BNP to moralise about terrorism. The Bologna bombing was initially blamed on an accident or the communist Red Brigades terrorist group, but it soon became clear that the fascist Armed Revoloutionary Nuclei had carried out the bombing, which was presumably designed to weaken support for the large Italian Communist Party, as Bologna was one of its strongholds.

The Italian Parliament's 13 year Slaughter Commission, which was investigating the Bologna massacre, and a series of other murderous "communist" and "anarchist" bombings in Italy in the 1960's, 1970's, and 1980's (hence its 'Slaughter Commission' name), concluded that the American CIA, and the Italian elite Masonic lodge P2, which included senior figures in the Italian Parliament, armed forces, secret services, and police forces, were responsible for the bombings, which it is now known were carried out by fascists to create public support for a fascist military coup.

On page 110 of David Yallop's book, "In God's Name: An Investigation into the Murder of Pope John Paul I" (Constable and Robinson, London, 2007), which has sold over 6 million copies around the world, and which is about the theory that P2 poisoned and murdered Pope John Paul I, because he was about to throw Freemasons out of the Vatican, Yallop mentions the fact that Italian former fascist terrorist Elio Ciolini, who had allegedly been a follower of P2's fascist Grand Master, Licio Gelli, had alleged that the Bologna bombing was planned at a P2 meeting in Monte Carlo on April 11, 1980.

Bologna was a well known stronghold of the Communist Party, so why would a communist terrorist group bomb the second class passengers' waiting room at its Central Station? Communists have historically got most of their support from working class people, who were probably the majority of the people in the second class waiting room on the morning of August 2, 1980. It is equally unlikely that anarchists, who have historically got most of their support from peasant and working class people, should have perpetrated the bombings which they were initially accused of in Italy, as those terrorist atrocities killed or injured many working class people.

Italian judge Guido Salvini indicted US Navy officer David Carrett as a suspect in a December 12, 1969 "anarchist" bombing of Milan's Piazza Fontana (Fontana Square), which killed 16, and injured 90, and which an Italian former fascist terrorist, Vincenzo Vinciguerra, has said was the work of fascist terrorists, and, although it should be pointed out that Carrett has never even been tried, never mind convicted for carrying out that bombing, it should also be pointed out if Salvini was indicting a US Navy officer as a Piazza Fontana suspect, it is hardly likely that anarchists were responsible for the atrocity.

The Piazza Fontana bombing also led to another death, that of Giuseppe Pinelli, an entirely innocent Italian anarchist railway worker, who "fell" to his death from the fourth floor of a Milan police station while he was being interrogated about his non-existent role in the bombing. Pinelli's death inspired Dario Fo's famous 1970 play, "Accidental Death of an Anarchist", which was broadcast on Channel 4 in 1983, and which has been performed in various British theatres in London, Birmingham, and other places.

Fiore's friend, political pupil, and former financial benefactor and business partner Nick Griffin, was also once a fan of 2 regimes which fund, or did fund terrorism (Colonel Gadaffi's Libya, and Iran's Islamist theocracy). A BBC News webpage, "Nick Griffin: Right wing chameleon" (June 29, 2001), explains how Griffin went to Libya to ask Colonel Gadaffi for funds for the National Front, which Griffin was then a member of. That visit is also discussed in a YouTube video, "Nick Griffin supports Muslim Extremism", which is a clip from an already mentioned BBC "Panorama" documentary, "Under the Skin". The "Panorama" documentary clip includes a photograph of Griffin in Libya, whose regime paid for his trip to Tripoli, as a "Searchlight" anti-BNP webpage which also includes that photo explains.

That webpage also mentions the fact that the "political soldier" wing of the NF, which Griffin created, as an already mentioned "Searchlight" article, "Nick Griffin political extremist and veteran splitter" (February 2008) pointed out, had been paying visits to the "Libyan People's Bureau" (the Libyan Embassy) in London, and had been expressing support for Colonel Gadaffi's Libya, so it is not surprising that the Libyan regime arranged an all expenses paid trip to Tripoli for Griffin. Colonel Gadaffi's Libya used to fund a number of terrorist groups of course, including the IRA.

The just mentioned "Searchlight" Stop the BNP webpage, and the previously mentioned "Searchlight" article, also refer to Nick Griffin's past support for Iran's Islamist theocracy, which has long funded Islamist terrorism (for example, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, and Hamas), so Griffin's past support for that regime is as hypocritical as his links to Fiore, and as his past links to Colonel Gadaffi's Libya.

Whether you believe the original theory that Ayatollah Khomeini's Iran paid Ahmed Jibril's Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine to carry out the Lockerbie bombing, to avenge the deaths of 290 Iranian pilgrims returning from Mecca, whose Iran Air Flight 655 airliner had been shot out of the sky by accident by the US Navy warship the USS Vincennes, or whether you believe the post 1991 Gulf War theory that Colonel Gadaffi's Libya was responsible (when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, Iran was needed for the anti-Iraq coalition, so some writers, like the late Paul Foot of "Private Eye", have alleged that American and British intelligence agencies started to point the finger at Libya so Iran could become part of the anti-Iraq coalition), Nick Griffin backed the regime which was responsible for the worst terrorist atrocity in British history.

That atrocity killed all of the 243 passengers and 16 crew on board Pan Am Flight 103, as well as 11 people in the village of Lockerbie, because the plane's nearly full fuel tanks (and wings) fell on their homes and exploded.

9/11 created a "Who should we hate now?" moment for Europe's far-right, as a "Searchlight" article, "International far-right reactions to the terrorist attacks on the USA" (October 2001) showed, because some of Europe's far-right continued to primarily hate Jewish people, and what they saw as the USA's "Zionist Occupation Government", which led to them applauding the 9/11 attacks, while the rest of Europe's far-right, including Nick Griffin, switched to primarily hating Muslim people, which is why Griffin used the attacks as an excuse to begin hypocritically moralising about Islamist terrorism.

Griffin was also allegedly a "close ally" of a pro-terrorism American fascist party (National Alliance) leader, the late William Pierce, who openly advocated killing all of the world's non-white and Jewish people with nuclear weapons, and the use of terrorist violence to kill such people. See my September 13th Lancaster Unity article, "Do the BNP and EFP leadership still believe in the mass slaughter of billions?", to learn more about Pierce's pro-global genocide views, and about Griffin allegedly being a "close ally" of his.

Of course, other British fascist groups have terrorist links, which is why "The Guardian" of December 13, 2008 featured a story called "Racist who had bomb kit jailed for campaign against couple", which discussed Nathan Worrell, a British People's Party, Ku Klux Klan, and November 9 Society terrorist, and which is why another article in the same newspaper, "Neo-Nazi convicted of planning terrorist bombing campaign" (July 15, 2009), discussed Neil Lewington, who was found by police to have 2 home made bombs, and fascist (Ku Klux Klan and Combat 18) literature, as well a video about the ex-BNP nail bomber David Copeland. A YouTube video, "BNP + Nazi terrorist Nathan Worrell", includes film of the BNP stickers which were found at Worrell's home. Another YouTube video, "Nazi terrorist Neil Lewington", is a BBC News clip about that fascist would-be bomber.

A third non-BNP fascist terrorist, Martyn Gilleard, was the subject of a BBC News online article, "Man jailed over nail bombs plot" (June 25, 2008). Police found 4 home-made nail bombs at his home, as well as bullets, swords, and axes (and 39,000 child pornography images). A second BBC News online article, "Neo-Nazi had child abuse images" (June 25, 2008), states that: "At the time of his arrest he [Gilleard] was a paid-up member of the National Front, the White Nationalist Party, and the British People's Party...".

Andrew Wells and Ian Hindle

Gilleard's British People's Party membership is also mentioned in a YouTube film, "BNP and NF Pedos Martyn Gilleard, Roderick Rowley, Ian Hindle + Andrew Wells", which is a clip from a Channel 4 News report. The report only discusses Gilleard, but the "more info" information on the right hand side of the page when the video is playing, mentions former BNP election candidate Roderick Rowley's child pornography conviction, and the child sexual abuse convictions of BNP members Ian Hindle and Andrew Wells, which were exposed after the BNP's membership list was posted online in 2008.

Despite the existence of non-BNP British fascist former terrorists, the BNP are the largest British fascist party, so it is no surprise that they seem to attract the most terrorists, and it is also no surprise that even the non-BNP terrorists Nathan Worrell and Neil Lewington had BNP stickers, or a video about an ex-BNP former terrorist at their homes.

The BNP may even attract more terrorists than other countries' fascist parties, because "Searchlight" has foreign readers who write articles for them about fascism in other countries, but that magazine has primarily featured BNP-linked terrorists in its articles, which have included: "Belgium: Arrested nazi terrorists included soldiers" (October 2006); "Italy - An endless cycle of terror" (May 2002); "Portrait of a bomber" (February 2001), which was about a terrorist bombing that was carried out by a member of the New Force party (whose leader is a certain Roberto Fiore, who, in 1999, was allowed to return to Italy, where he became a fascist MEP); and "Unmasking the Anti Anti-Fa" (May 2000), which mentions German fascist terrorism.

See Martin Lee's book, "The Beast Reawakens: The Chilling Story of the Rise of the Neo-Nazi Movement" (Warner Books, London, 1998), to learn more about modern fascist terrorism in Italy, Germany, and Belgium.

Perhaps not even an American fascist party has attracted as many terrorists as the BNP, despite that country's size. See my already mentioned September 13th Lancaster Unity article, "Do the BNP and EFP leadership still believe in the mass slaughter of billions?", to read about various American fascist terrorists, who, like the ex-BNP London nail bomber David Copeland, were inspired by the genocidal ideas of the late National Alliance leader William Pierce.

A YouTube video, "BNP + Nazi Terrorism", which is a clip from a BBC documentary, "Panorama Special - The Nailbomber", which was originally broadcast on June 30, 2000, discusses David Copeland's [pictured left] involvement with the BNP, and his admission that his bombings were inspired by "The Turner Diaries", which the documentary said was "sold through BNP magazines". So much for the supposedly mainstream BNP. Do the big 3 parties, UKIP, or the Greens sell novels through their party magazines in which billions of people are exterminated with nuclear weapons?

In reality, like other totalitarian organisations, the BNP is a haven for psychopaths and other dangerous individuals, and has nothing to do with mainstream politics.

Another BNP type fascist group which is a haven for psychopaths and other dangerous individuals, the even more extreme National Socialist Movement, has a tiny past and present membership which includes 3 men who are serving life sentences for murders, London nail bomber David Copeland, Charlie Sargent, and Martin Cross, so it is no surprise that the BNP has had to ban convicted criminals from standing in elections, because anti-fascists had been able to use their leaflets to point to the numerous BNP candidates with convictions for terrorist offences, racist violence, gang rape, child sexual abuse, football hooliganism, and other violent crimes.

The NSM were profiled in an already-mentioned BBC documentary, "Panorama Special: The Nailbomber". They are not to be confused with a different National Socialist Movement of the past, whose members included a certain Andrew Brons, who is now the BNP MEP for Yorkshire and Humberside. While the previous NSM did not spawn any terrorists, it did spawn some arsonists, as a "Searchlight" HOPE not hate webpage, "The real BNP: Andrew Brons" explains. It states: "NSM members were responsible for an arson campaign against Jewish property and synagogues in the 1960's."

"Brons appears to have approved. In a [garbled] letter to [hardline fascist Colin] Jordan's wife, Brons reported meeting an NSM member who "mentioned such activities as bombing synagogues." He declared: "On this subject I have a dual view, in that I realise that he is well intentioned, I feel that our public image may suffer considerable damage as a result of these activities. I am however open to correction on this point.""

Like BNP founder John Tyndall, Colin Jordan was a disciple of the pre-World War Two Imperial Fascist League leader Arnold Leese, who advocated gassing Jews before the Nazis (in 1936).

Because British fascists are at least partly responsible for far more racist violence than fascists in any other Western European country, as an official European Union report which you can download here shows (in England and Wales, there are several times more racist crimes each year than in Germany, which has a roughly 30% bigger population than England and Wales), it is hardly surprising that the BNP appear to attract more terrorists than any other fascist party on the planet. As an April 22, 2009 EU Business article which you can read here explains, a survey has revealed that the true level of racist violence in the EU, is far higher than the level in official government statistics, which makes it even less surprising that the BNP attracts so many terrorists.

Do the BNP act as “conveyor belt” to violent extremism?

See Nick Griffin defend neo-Nazi terrorists

Does rising electoral support for racist parties like the BNP lead to more racial violence?

The conviction [last] week of Neil Lewington, a neo-Nazi who planned a terror campaign in Britain, certainly raises that question.

Lewington is one of the nastiest (if crack-pot) potential neo-Nazi terrorists in recent history. In his summing up, the Judge said Lewington’s terrorist actions were “designed to intimidate non-white people … for the purpose of pursuing the ideological cause of white supremacy and neo-fascism, albeit in a rather unsophisticated way.” In Lewington’s bedroom police found a nail bomb factory and a notebook entitled “Waffen SS UK Members’ Handbook”.

During the trial the court heard about one of Lewington’s inspirations, David Copeland, the Soho nail bomber and former member of the BNP. (Another was Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma bomber).

Despite there being no evidence of Lewington’s involvement with the BNP (he appears to have been a lone wolf), his attempt to emulate the likes of Copeland raises the question: does the electoral success of the BNP lead to violent extremism?

The BNP is legitimate political party operating within the law. For that we should be thankful.

It does, however, hold many white supremacist and neo-fascist views which have direct lineage to Oswald Mosley, the German Nazi Party, the American KKK, Roberto Fiore and modern East European extremists like Jobbik. This is particularly true of leadership figures like Nick Griffin MEP, Andrew Brons MEP, Lee Barnes (Legal Director) and Mark Collett (Head of Publicity).

Whilst all parties have their rotten eggs, the BNP has more than its fair share of violent racists. Some like Robert Cottage (who stood as a BNP candidate three times) and Tony Lecomber were BNP activists. Others like Copeland and Mark Bullman (who used a BNP leaflet to light his firebomb) were on the fringe. (More details here).

Certainly the pool of candidates is likely to grow. The election and consequent media promotion of Nick Griffin and Andrew Brons gives a certain level of legitimacy to the BNP and its ideals. This means disaffected people trying to find answers to their worries are more likely to turn to the politics of racism, segregation and intolerance and follow the examples set by the BNP’s high profile leaders and violent members.

And the temperature is likely to increase, particularly if politicians refuse to debate the issues that leave some of the population feeling angry, frustrated and dispossessed. Those issues include immigration, Britishness and joblessness.

Experts on Irish Republicanism and Islamism call this the “conveyor belt” to violence. It is too early for any clear evidence either way. But we fear that the election of a small number of weird, nutty and inadequate politicians legitimises the politics of racism and that, in turn, introduces an element of violence and intimidation to British society that changes the way we do politics forever.

Nothing British

Tea and mugs at the BNP garden party

An English village, a summer festival – what could be more agreeable? But beneath the traditional trappings lies an air of menace.

Showing their true colours - an Obama effigy comes in for a soaking at the RWB

A man wearing Islamic dress and an Osama Bin Laden mask poked his head through wooden stocks and was pelted with sponges for his trouble, while a neighbouring stall did a roaring trade in golliwog mugs and Union flag badges. This was not your average summer fete. A bouncy castle and ice-cream van did little to lighten the mood at the British National Party's festival yesterday.

BNP members, huddled under tarpaulin and shivering in their shorts, appeared less than thrilled by the grey Derbyshire skies and chill breeze that heralded the start of their annual summer gathering.

Listed in the Domesday Book, the sleepy village of Codnor in the Amber Valley district is a former mining community, with a population of just under 5,000. Only 12 miles from Derby and 14 from Nottingham, Codnor (chillingly for those who live there) is regarded by the BNP as "the heart of a rural district whose ancient history and cultural heritage exemplify all that is steadfastly and typically Anglo-Saxon".

The "Red, White and Blue" festival was billed as a family event. In this case the "family" extended beyond mum, dad and a couple of sticky-fingered children. One cousin from out of town was missing: a US white supremacist was banned from entering Britain for the festival last week. But others had rallied and speeches were scheduled from Roberto Fiore, leader of the Italian far-right Forza Nuova and a friend of the BNP leader, Nick Griffin.

And, of course, there were members of the BNP "family" from closer to home. "It is nice to speak to people from different countries who share our views," said Dave Clarke, 56, who has attended the event for the past five years. Like many at the festival, Mr Clarke wore his political allegiance on his chest: a T-shirt bearing the St George's Cross and a row of BNP stickers decorating the brim of his hat.

Most who attended yesterday came with their children, and in this Mr Clarke was no exception. He brought his 16-year-old daughter, Rebecca, hoping she would "learn about her culture and heritage, things that are being forgotten".

Along with family, British culture and heritage were high on the agenda. When Mr Griffin picked up the microphone in the "Political Tent", it was not to speak of the party's political future but about researching his family's history. He encouraged others to do the same.

Numerous posters celebrated British soldiers who fought in the First and Second World Wars, while in one corner of the field a group of white wooden crosses commemorated "people who have died as a result of anti-white violence". It was one of many surreal touches in an event that both fascinated and appalled in its apparent normality: a Ford Ka was up for grabs in a raffle, while a coconut shy featured images of Tony Blair, Jack Straw and Gordon Brown, offering festival-goers the chance to "knock a traitor off the stick".

Amid makeshift cafés selling tea and cakes sat marquees run by local BNP branches. At the Manchester stall, "Then and Now" displays contrasted photographs of white 1960s schoolboys with modern schools in the city's multicultural Moss Side area, beside slogans claiming that schools have been "dumbed down" to meet the needs of immigrants.

Media entry was tightly controlled. All but the most like-minded journalists, myself included, were assigned two minders; some publications were denied access altogether.

Things were getting a little ugly on the other side of the iron gates and thick hedgerows – not to mention countless security guards and policemen – that separated BNP members from about 1,500 anti-fascist protesters. The Derbyshire force put the cost of policing this year's protest at some £500,000, and reported a score of arrests as demonstrators hurled missiles, including eggs and flour, in frustration at being unable to get to the BNP members. Many had travelled to Codnor with groups such as Stop the BNP, Unite Against Fascism and the Trades Union Congress.

"We know they have a hardcore neo-Nazi membership, but in holding events like this they are trying to secure new members," said 43-year-old Dean Ryan, from London. "We're here to remind those people that this is not just a fun day out. I'm planning to protest peacefully, but I've seen the BNP be violent and as far as I'm concerned self-defence is no offence."

Snippets of chants from the protesters drifted across the site. Refrains such as "What shall we do with the BNP? What shall we do with the BNP? String them up like Mussolini" created a sense of unease, although the voices were frequently drowned out by the constant whirring of a police helicopter circling overhead.

The BNP professed itself happy with the way the day had turned out. "We've chosen a very secure site here," said Mr Griffin. "We're tucked away, so we're not in people's faces. It is discreet. We haven't done much marketing this year, but I'd say we've got more than last year."

The people who live nearby were considerably less happy. For them, the gathering had been as much of a nuisance as they had predicted. With roads closed and hundreds of protesters chanting, local residents do not look forward to the festival, which has been held in the town for the past three years.

Kevin Grant, 50, who lives less than a mile from the festival site, viewed the whole thing as an irritant: "Last year I was called a neo-Nazi by protesters, and I don't even vote for the BNP. This year we've been told to stay in our houses all day."

Independent

Griffin tries to build extremist bloc in Europe

Party will share £22m windfall if it can forge alliance in Strasbourg

The British National Party is attempting to patch together an alliance of extremist nationalist organisations across Europe in order to unlock hundreds of thousands of pounds of extra funding.

The party secured its biggest mainstream electoral victory in the early hours of yesterday when Nick Griffin, the chairman of the far-right party, became its second member to be elected to the European Parliament. Hours earlier, Andrew Brons, a former chairman of the National Front who has a long history in far-right politics, became the party's first MEP after winning almost 10 per cent of the vote in Yorkshire and the Humber.

Mr Griffin achieved his long-term ambition of being elected to Brussels after scraping through to take the last of eight seats for the North East. Both men will be entitled to about £310,000 in annual funding, including an £80,443 salary, a staff budget of up to £182,000 and £40,000 for office expenses. But the British National Party (BNP) could also unlock a share of the £22.8m allowance that is given to parliamentary groups if it can find at least 25 fellow MEPs from seven member states willing to form a bloc within the European Parliament.

Being part of a group is crucial in terms of power as it entitles members to EU funding, a party office, administrative staff and, crucially, the right to vote in committees which are the nerve centre of the Parliament. A parliamentary group is also entitled to up to £5m of extra funding over the next five-year term.

A number of far-right groups have secured seats in the European Parliament, many of whom hold outwardly racist or neo-fascist policies. Prior to the European elections, high-ranking members of the BNP had attended rallies held by neo-Nazis in both Italy and Hungary.

Simon Darby, the deputy chairman of the BNP, said Mr Griffin would begin looking for groups with which the party could form alliances.

"In the long term it would be to our advantage [to form a bloc]," he said. "Whether we will find people with enough in common I don't know, we'll have to wait for the dust to settle."

Mr Darby, who failed to win an MEP seat in the West Midlands, which had been considered one of the BNP's strongest areas, declined to specify which groups the party was talking to but he said they would look to form an alliance with France's far–right National Front. He added: "We believe in talking to people even if they have different views to our own."

In the run up to the European elections, senior BNP leaders including Mr Griffin and Mr Darby went on a series of trips to Europe to meet with fellow far-right activists.

In April, Mr Darby was welcomed with fascist salutes by members of the Italian nationalist Forza Nuova party during a trip to Milan. Headed by Roberto Fiore, a leading far-right Italian politician and a long-time friend of Mr Griffin, Forza Nuova campaigns for the expulsion of an estimated 150,000 Roma gypsies from Italy.

The BNP already has a relationship with Jobbik, a Hungarian party with its own civilian militia which won three of Hungary's 22 seats. Critics say its policies are overtly anti-Roma and anti–Semitic. Last October Mr Griffin spoke at a rally of more than 5,000 Jobbik supporters in Budapest. He has also met Jobbik activists in London.

A spokesperson for Searchlight, the anti-racism group, told The Independent that their activists would now go to Brussels to monitor the groups with which the BNP forms alliances.

"In the past the BNP have made efforts to keep their dealings with extremist parties across Europe very much under wraps," a spokesperson said. "Now those relationships will be under intense public scrutiny and we will be able to highlight the sort of company that the BNP keep."

Labour MEP for London Claude Moraesa said: "Fascists in the European Parliament where I sit have long wanted members from Britain to join this transnational group so for those reasons there is deep concern that we have now crossed that threshold."

Independent

BNP election hopes marred by dodgy fascist pals of leader Nick Griffin

Convicted criminals, Nazi skinheads, violent thugs... not exactly the type of people you'd want to be pals with. But this motley crew of racists and fascists are Nick Griffin's closest European buddies.

The BNP leader is trying his best to project the image of a respectable, well dressed politician in the run-up to the European elections on Thursday. And he knows that, if people find out who he likes to hang out with, his chances will be ruined.

Here we expose the truth about the BNP's European friends...

AUSTRIA

Andreas Molzer - once booted out of Austria's far-right Freedom Party (FPO) for being too extreme - is one of Griffin's closest European allies.

The Austrian MEP runs a newspaper, renowned for spouting racist, xenophonic and anti-Semitic views. The rag - Zur Zeit - has even questioned accepted accounts of the Holocaust and recently featured a fawning interview with Griffin.

Molzer, 57, who is married with five children, was expelled from the FPO in 2005 after he accused it of being too soft on immigration. He was only let back in last year when fellow hard-liner Heinz-Christian Strache, 50, took over the leadership. Strache, 50, has demanded the repeal of Austrian laws banning the swastika and once branded women wearing Islamic dress as "female ninjas".

ITALY

Italian MEP Roberto Fiore is leader of the neo-fascist Forza Nuova party, which has campaigned for the expulsion of an estimated 150,000 Roma gipsies from Italy.

He has been a political mentor, financial supporter and close friend of BNP leader Griffin since 1980, when he moved to Britain in the wake of the fascist Bologna railway station bombing which killed 85 people, including two British tourists.

While here, he helped Griffin - who hadn't yet joined the BNP - set up his Political Soldiers group after it split from the National Front.

Fiore was convicted in Italy in his absence in 1985 as a result of his involvement in the terrorist Armed Revolutionary Nuclei, whose members had taken part in the Bologna terrorist outrage. His nine year prison sentence was later reduced to five and a half on appeal.

HUNGARY

Zoltan Fuzessy is vice president of Hungary's ultra right-wing Jobbik party - but lives in the UK and has fostered close links with the BNP. The father-of-two ran an anti-Jewish hate website until last year and has spoken at BNP meetings.

Jobbik - Movement for a Better Hungary - uses Nazi insignia and has been linked to a deadly series of grenade, petrol bomb and gun attacks on Hungarian gipsies. But all that did not stop Griffin speaking in front of 5,000 Jobbik supporters last year at a rally in Budapest, where he shared a stage with notorious Hungarian racist Gyorgy Budahazy.

When a bunch of fascist yobs were arrested after going on the rampage Griffin toured the police stations where they were being held. The BNP leader insisted he was trying to ensure they were given "due process" and decent treatment.

Last year Budahazy showed his true colours when issuing a joint communique with another fascist leader, Laszlo Toroczkai, calling on Hungarian racists to disrupt the annual Budapest gay parade.

"We will not permit aberrant foreigners of this or that colour to force their alien and sick world on Hungary," it said.

GERMANY

Nick Griffin's BNP aligns itself with the pro-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD) in Germany whose chairman, Udo Voigt, praises Hitler as a "great statesman".

In August 2002 Griffin attended a festival put on by the NPD's newspaper Deutsche Stimme (German Voice), where he was photographed with Voigt and the former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke. That month he took part in an NPD summer school with Mahler and Voigt.

Another German ally of BNP is Nazi skinhead leader Jens Puhse, who was recently acquitted of producing and distributing racist CDs. A member of the National Front until it was banned in 1997, he is now leader of the German National Democratic Party and a leading figure in the European National Front (ENF), an umbrella group for some of Europe's most extreme and openly facist organisations.

They include groups that deny the Holocaust, worship Adolf Hitler and other wartime fascist leaders, and have been linked to terrorism.

FRANCE

The BNP admires the National Front and has modelled much of its own modernisation on the resurgent French fascist party. Its leader, Jean Marie Le Pen, served in Algeria in the 1950s and has been accused of torturing prisoners there.

A convicted Holocaust denier, Penn - who is divorced with three daughters - has also been convicted of racism or inciting racial hatred at least six times. In June 1999 he was fined for stating that the Holocaust was "just a detail in the history of the Second World War" and in April 2000 he was fined again and suspended from the European Parliament for assaulting a female candidate from a rival party during an election campaign.

Le Pen was Griffin's star guest during the BNP's European campaign in April 2004. After he claimed that Britain was being "invaded" by the Third World at a press conference in Manchester, protesters hurled rocks and eggs at his car.

Griffin's attention has now turned to Bruno Gollnisch, Le Pen's deputy, who is challenging Le Pen's daughter for leadership of the FN. Gollnisch, who is married with three children, has also been convicted for denying the Holocaust, for which he spent three months in prison in 2007.

Griffin brought Gollnisch over to Britain in April last year, where he addressed a private gathering of BNP supporters in London.

SWEDEN

The leader of Sweden's fascist National Democrats (ND) party was sentenced to 18 months in prison in 2003 for assault and rioting after he and a fascist mob attacked a Gay Pride festival in Stockholm.

Marc Abramsson also runs the socalled Action Group (AKG), which provides security for Swedish fascist meetings and visiting fascists such as Griffin. This heavy mob is largely composed of members of the nazi Blood and Honour network.

Griffin has forged a close relationship with the ND leader, helping the party in European election campaigns. Abramsson was ND candidate in the 2004 European election.

BELGIUM

Filip Dewinter leads Belgium's far-right nationalist party Vlaams Belang (Flemmish Interest), which took over from the Vlaams Blok party after it was found in contempt of the law on racism and xenophobia and banned.

At a meeting of Vlaams Blok in 1991, former journalist Dewinter proclaimed: "Our own people first! And yes, Vlaams Blok chooses a Flemish Flanders. And yes, Vlaams Blok chooses a white Europe!" Griffin's most recent public contact with VB was in December 2006 when he went to Belgium to attend the "Euro-Rus Congress", a pan-European event organised by VB's Kris Romain.

CZECH

Republic Leader of the far-right National Party (Narodni Strana), which has its own paramilitary squad, Petra Edelmannova was the brains behind a racist TV ad aired in the Czech Republic last month which called for a "final solution" to the issue of gipsies in her country.

In the broadcast, accompanied by the slogan "Stop Favouring Gipsies", she stresses the case for "repatriating the Czech Republic's entire Roma community to India".

An avid racist, she was arrested in October 2006 following a demonstration in Prague's Wenceslas Square under a banner reading "Let's incinerate Muslim hatred". She had handed out leaflets illustrated with caricatures of Muslim figures and the caption "Let's Burn Hatred".

Last August Edelmannova, who is married with a daughter, gave a speech at the BNP's Red, White and Blue festival in Codnor, Derbys. Two months later, Griffin repaid the favour by addressing a National Party rally where he railed against the accession of Turkey to the EU, saying that the introduction of millions of Muslims into the EU would "drive down wages, living standards and increase taxes".

Daily Mirror

Why race-hate spouting BNP chief Nick Griffin should have no place at garden party

I've never been to a Royal garden party, and I'm not sure if you have either. The principle is clear though - they're an opportunity for the Queen to meet and thank those people who have made a significant contribution to their country and their community.

Obviously the great and the good get invited. But so do thousands of ordinary hardworking Britons who have quietly but steadfastly done their bit to improve our society.

Nick Griffin is not one of those people.

He's a criminal, with a conviction for incitement to racial hatred. He's a racist, who said last week that black Britons, including footballers David James, Sol Campbell and Rio Ferdinand could never be British. Griffin's also got some pretty nasty friends.

A couple of weeks ago the Mirror exposed his meeting with Don Black, a former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan banned from the UK on grounds of national security. And last month he sent his Deputy Simon Darby to meet up with Roberto Fiore, a man convicted for his links to the Armed Revolutionary Nuclei terrorist group responsible for the Bologna railway bombing, which killed 85 people, including two British tourists.

You'd think on security grounds alone, there would be questions about the BNP leader gaining entry to Buckingham Palace. But he is set to sneak in as a guest of BNP activist Richard Barnbrook, who is a member of the London Assembly.

Griffin himself obviously can't wait to crash the party. As the editor of the BNP magazine said yesterday: "The Palace garden party publicity stunt is reaping 100 times more attention than we had envisaged."

He certainly doesn't want to go so he can pay his respects to the Queen or her family. Griffin has branded Prince Charles a traitor because "he has made known his desire to represent people of all faiths and races". Mark Collett, the BNP director of publicity, was filmed saying: "The Royals have betrayed their people. When we're in power they'll be wiped out." There's a little part of me that would quite like Nick Griffin to meet the Queen.

Given Her Majesty is head of the Commonwealth, I'd like to see him explain his party's policy of rounding up all her black and Asian subjects and removing them from the country. I'd also like him to meet Prince Harry, recently returned from Afghanistan where he fought alongside the Gurkhas. When asked about the Gurkhas' campaign to stay in the UK Griffin responded: "Our policy position is the country is full. No more immigrants."

But though I'd love to watch Griffin squirm defending his hateful agenda it wouldn't be much fun for the other guests. Imagine you're a local community or charity worker. You've received an invite to the Palace. You put on your best dress or suit. You arrive, possibly with your elderly mum or dad on your arm. You feel proud.

Then you walk on to the Palace lawn, and who's standing in front of you. Nick Griffin. Racist. Criminal. Imagine how you'd feel. If you're black. If you're Jewish. If, unlike Griffin, you have hope, rather than hate, in your heart.

I've heard all the arguments. He's got a right to attend. His views may be controversial, but you can't censor him. Don't make him a martyr. Yes Nick Griffin's got rights. The trouble is, if he got his way those rights would be removed from millions of British citizens who don't have the same colour skin as him.

His views aren't just controversial. They're so extreme they have lead to his conviction in a court of law. A martyr? Because he might be denied a cup of tea and a cucumber sandwich? It's 70 years since Nazi boots first marched into Poland. People fought, and died, to prevent those same boots marching across the lawn of Buckingham Palace.

Some of those who lived through that struggle will no doubt be there on July 21. They have earned their invitation.

Nick Griffin has not.

Mirror

BNP deputy leader addresses international fascist rally

Speakers enter the hotel greeted by fascist salutes

The deputy leader of the British National Party has spoken at an international fascist rally alongside a man convicted of a terrorism offence and a convicted Holocaust denier.

Simon Darby claims he addressed a 400-strong audience in Milan today (5 April). Representatives of extreme-right parties in Germany, France, Romania, Hungary and Cyprus were expected to take part in the meeting.

Darby, who flew out to Italy this morning, heads the BNP’s European election candidates’ list for the West Midlands, a region in which the party could win a seat. He has a “Mr Clean” reputation in a party in which many leading activists have criminal convictions, a nazi past or both.

The rally was titled: “Our Europe; Peoples and Traditions Against Banks and Big Powers”, a change from the original, “Our Europe; Peoples and Traditions Against Banks and Usury”. The term “usury” is traditionally used by Nazis against Jews and it may have been altered to avoid accusations of antisemitism.

It had been booked at a major conference centre in Milan, but widespread protests from MEPs and Italian partisan veterans, as well as a 20,000-strong petition forced its move to a private hotel.

Simon Darby (right) with Bruno Gollnisch MEP (left) and Roberto Fiore MEP (second from left)

The meeting was organised by Forza Nuova, whose leader Roberto Fiore, was convicted in Italy in 1985 for “subversive association” for his involvement in the Armed Revolutionary Nuclei. Two members of that organisation were convicted for the Bologna railway station bombing in August 1980 which killed 85 people, including two British tourists, Catherine Mitchell and John Kolpinski, and left over 200 wounded. It was the biggest postwar terrorist attack in Europe.

Fiore became an MEP after Alessandra Mussolini, granddaughter of the Italian fascist dictator, resigned her seat to take up a post in the Italian government. He has been a friend, financial supporter and political mentor to BNP leader Nick Griffin since 1980, when Fiore arrived in Britain on the run from justice in Italy.

Fiore helped Griffin run the National Front “political soldiers”, described at the time as a “proto-terrorist organisation”. When the political soldiers collapsed, they went on to found a new fascist group, the International Third Position.

Alongside his political activities Fiore amassed a huge fortune through business interests in London and later around the world. They included operating as a slum landlord and exploiting people brought in from eastern Europe, Italy and Spain, whom he passed on to gang masters to work on the land and in food processing plants.

Fiore was also one of the founders of the extremely violent Hammerskins skinhead movement, part of the nazi music and football hooligan gangs responsible for violence on the terraces. They have strong links with one of the most vicious fascist football hooligan gangs in Europe, the Roma Ultras, who recently attacked English football fans, stabbing one. Their most infamous episode was when they unfurled a banner down one side of their home stadium with the words “Jews to Auschwitz”.

Father Giulio Tam raises his hand in support of fascism

Hammerskins members recently marched through Bergamo in northern Italy armed with sticks and metal bars and with helmets on their heads. At their head were Fiore and Father Giulio Tam, a priest revered by Spanish falangistas and Italian fascists, who blessed the FN’s new headquarters in the town. Father Tam was in the audience at the Milan rally.

Fiore is closely associated with the Catholic Society of St Pius X, in which Bishop Richard Williamson was a leading light. In January 2009 in a television interview Bishop Williamson denied the existence of the Nazi gas chambers, a statement that caused a scandal when the Pope lifted his longstanding excommunication a week later.

Also in prime position on the platform with Darby was Bruno Gollnisch. An MEP for the French National Front, Gollnisch was given a three-month suspended prison sentence in January 2007 for denying the Holocaust. He was also fined €5,000.

The court, in Lyon, found he had “disputed a crime against humanity” in remarks he made during a news conference in the city in October 2004. Gollnisch, who was chair of the Identity Tradition and Sovereignty far-right official group in the European Parliament, had questioned the number of Jews who died in the Holocaust and said the “existence of the gas chambers is for historians to discuss”.

Security for the fascist rally - almost as ugly as Martin Reynolds

In April last year, just three days before polling day in the London Assembly election, in which the BNP won one seat, Griffin brought Gollnisch and other European extremists to a private meeting in a South Kensington hotel.

The meeting took place at a time when Griffin, a long-time Jew-hater who has a conviction for race hate, had approached the Jewish community in a bid to form a united front against Muslims, an invitation that the Jewish community firmly rejected.

Despite the BNP’s anti-EU stance, Griffin is keen to build links with European far-right parties, hoping that if he is elected as an MEP, he will be able to join a far-right bloc. If enough far-right MEPs can put aside their nationalist rivalries and form an official group in the European Parliament, they will benefit from a further €1 million a year on top of their salaries and staffing and expenses allowances. They would also be entitled to committee positions and enhanced speaking rights.

In October Griffin addressed an open-air rally of the Hungarian hardline fascist Jobbik party and its private army heavy mob, the Hungarian Guard, in Budapest. Griffin has been flirting with the Hungarian fascists since May when he met the Jobbik representatives Bela Kovacs and Zoltan Fuzessy in London.

Jobbik, also known as the Movement for a Better Hungary, is strongly anti-Jewish. Although the BNP has courted the Jewish community and denies it is antisemitic, Darby said recently on a radio broadcast that BNP MEPs would welcome cooperation with Jobbik.

A few days after his return from Hungary Griffin was cementing his relationship with the tiny anti-immigration, anti-Muslim and anti-Romani Czech National Party (NS) by addressing its rally to celebrate Czech independence. Griffin’s trip, accompanied by several BNP activists, followed the visit by the NS leader, Petra Edelmannová, to the BNP’s Red White and Blue festival last August.

That Darby has now joined Griffin in linking up with these far-right extremists in Europe shows that the BNP is still an out-and-out fascist and antisemitic party, despite the fine words and smart suits of its leaders.

Searchlight

A quick peek under the apron, beagle attack and the 'return' of two old favourites

What an exciting week it's been for the massed lunatics of the far-right. This last week has seen Lee Barnes, the BNP's legal beagle, have a go at us because according to him we at Lancaster Unity are all racists, and the North West Nationalist blog getting into a frenzy at the news (?) that Nick Eriksen and Tony Lecomber had returned to the BNP fold. Oh yes, and that Nick Griffin's father Edgar has been a Freemason for the past sixty-odd years.

Taking these in reverse order for no particular reason, we read that Edgar Griffin (pictured, centre) has been awarded something or the other (we don't care) for being a Freemason for more than six decades. Edgar, as our regular readers will know, is an accountant who has been repeatedly linked to Roberto Fiore, an old friend of his son. As recently as February of this year, Edgar was found to have been doing the accounts for CL English Language, a college in west London that teaches hundreds of foreign students each year, run by neo-fascist Fiore, leader of Forza Nuova, an extreme right-wing party.

Fiore arrived in Britain in October 1980 as a 21-year-old fugitive from the Italian police, who wanted to question him about the Bologna train station bombing two months earlier in which 85 people were killed and more than 200 injured. He was reputed to be a member of the extreme right-wing organisation the Armed Revolutionary Nuclei, several of whose members were subsequently convicted of mass murder. After being arrested by Scotland Yard officers the following year, Fiore was brought before Bow Street court, but the authorities in Rome failed to secure his extradition. Fiore settled in London and became friendly with Nick Griffin; the two are reported to have shared a flat and are also said to have run a travel agency together.

Edgar, who introduced his son to the National Front by taking him along to a meeting when the younger Griffin was just fifteen, has been a life-long Freemason, as was his father Edwin before him. Edwin, according to Martin Webster, a former colleague and claimed ex-lover of Nick Griffin, left his grandson, the current leader of the BNP, £300,000 in his will in the late eighties, which 'he quickly lost in stupid property deals'.

An article on the web page of the Mark Master Masons of North Wales details the celebrations at the Lodge:

'In 1992 he received further promotion to the rank of Active Grand Junior Deacon. W. Bro. Edgar Griffin was Elevated in the Degree of the Ancient and Honourable Fraternity of Royal Ark Mariner on 31st August 1955 (52 years ago) in the Barnet Lodge of Royal Ark Mariners No. 947. He was Installed as Worshipful Commander in 1964. He was elected Holder of Provincial Royal Ark Mariner Grand Rank in 1985 and received Royal Ark Mariner Grand Rank in 1990. After a period of years spent in Suffolk, and having been granted Honorary Membership of his Mark and RAM Lodges, he moved to Welchpool where he has continued his Masonic careers in our Degrees by becoming Worshipful Master in 2002 and Worshipful Commander in 2005.'

Whoopee.

Back in the real world, we hear that two of Nick Griffin's old friends have returned to his side - or at least that's what the North West Nationalist blog seems to think. Describing them as 'two vile and totally disreputable creatures', the article reports the returns of Nick Eriksen and Tony Lecomber.

There isn't much to say about these two scumbags except to remind our readers why they are so universally loathed (except, apparently, by Nick Griffin). Eriksen, you may recall, claimed that women were more troubled by bag theft than rape and also advocated violence against women on his 'Sir John Bull' blog, as reported by the Evening Standard just prior to the last elections. The subsequent furore cost him his position as the BNP's London organiser and as the second-highest candidate on its list for the Assembly.

Tony Lecomber, former Group Development Officer for the British National Party, is much more complicated and has quite a history with the far-right. In 1986, he was convicted on five counts for offences under the Explosives Act, including possession of homemade hand-grenades and electronic timing devices, and earned himself a derisory three year sentence. In 1991 he was sentenced to a further three years for unlawful wounding for his part in an attack on a Jewish teacher who he caught trying to peel off a BNP sticker at an underground station. He has a total of 12 convictions.

His most recent claim to fame is that he was expelled from the BNP after attempting to solicit a well-known alleged hitman to assassinate establishment figures 'who are aiding and abetting the coloured invasion of this country', an act of terrorism prompted by racism. The full story is here. Following this lunacy, he was thrown out of the party (January 16th 2006) and was proscribed to the membership - meaning nobody in the party was allowed to talk to him or in any way to associate with him.

Obviously, the proscription didn't apply to Nick Griffin because we received reports that Lecomber was helping out all over the place, planning and working side by side with Griffin himself.

In fact, contrary to the North West Nationalist report, neither Eriksen or Lecomber have ever really left the party at all. Lecomber, who is long known as being a confidente of Griffins, knows where the bodies are buried and cannot be allowed to be cast aside for fear that he might spill the beans. Eriksen's views are abhorent but not, we are told, that much different from those of the great leader himself, who has simply been waiting for what he considers to be a suitable amount of time to elapse since his remarks were made public to bring the arch-misogynist back.

These are just Griffin's old pals, creeping back into the party via the back door. Whether they are welcomed home by a membership that is rapidly losing confidence in its leadership is another matter entirely.

And we're back to Lee Barnes, the BNP's legal beagle and surely one of the most tedious and insane writers ever.

Barnes' problem this week is apparently that he has identified Lancaster Unity as 'the most racist organisation in the country'. Oo-er. And on what does he base this bizarre statement? Largely because we have 'remained silent on the ongoing racism of Hollywood against the English and anyone with blonde hair and blue eyes'.

To support this stupidity, Barnes refers to a film he has obviously seen recently.

'My present favourite negaive [sic] image of the English as propagandised by the racists in Hollywood is that of Tim Roth in the new The Hulk movie.'

As I've never seen The Hulk, and am unlikely to, I can't possibly comment on it except to suggest to Barnes that he tries to watch some more intelligent films - perhaps something that's designed to appeal more to adults with brains than adolescents with pimples.

Toodle-pip.

Language school run by Italian fascist leader

• BNP leader Nick Griffin's parents do the accounts
• Students from Africa and far east at London college

A popular language college in London is controlled by the leader of an Italian neo-fascist party who has links to the British National Party, the Guardian has learned

CL English Language, a college in west London that teaches hundreds of foreign students each year, is controlled by Roberto Fiore, leader of Forza Nuova, an extreme right-wing party. Fiore, who once said he was happy to be described as a neo-fascist and who is an old friend and mentor of Nick Griffin, leader of the BNP, was appointed as a director of the college more than two years ago and became sole director in August last year. [Fiore had control of the College of that name based at 170 Westminister Bridge Road. In fact the building was used at least a couple of times as the venue for Fiore's International Fascist gatherings.]

Many of the students, who pay up to £30 an hour for tuition, are Italian, while others are from Africa, the far east and eastern Europe. None of those interviewed outside the college last week were aware of Fiore's involvement. Staff at the college have said there are usually more than 100 students there at any one time. Despite its size, however, its latest accounts show that it recorded a profit of just £2,214 during 2006, and £1,821 the year before.

The accountants for the college are Edgar and Jean Griffin, Nick Griffin's parents, who live in Welshpool, Powys. Edgar Griffin confirmed that the language school was a "substantial business", but declined to say why its reported profits were so small. "You must know that an accountant can't talk about his client's affairs to anyone, leave alone a newspaper," he said.

The BNP's spokesman and deputy leader, Simon Darby, denied the party received funds from the school. Asked about the party's relationship with Fiore he said: "If I did know I wouldn't tell you. I know that he knows Nick [Griffin]. I have never met the man." Fiore and his lawyer have repeatedly declined to answer questions about CL English, or about his relationship with Griffin and his parents. The college principal declined to comment on the college finances, but said: "There is nothing illegal going on."

Fiore arrived in Britain in October 1980 as a 21-year-old fugitive from the Italian police, who wanted to question him about the Bologna train station bombing two months earlier in which 85 people were killed and more than 200 injured.

He was reputed to be a member of the extreme right-wing organisation the Armed Revolutionary Nuclei, several of whose members were subsequently convicted of mass murder. After being arrested by Scotland Yard officers the following year, Fiore was brought before Bow Street court, but the authorities in Rome failed to secure his extradition.

Fiore settled in London and became friendly with Griffin; the two are reported to have shared a flat and are also said to have run a travel agency together.

In Rome, meanwhile, he was cleared of involvement in the bombing, but was convicted of subversive association and jailed for nine years, reduced to five-and-a-half on appeal. The jail term was eventually "timed out" under Italy's statute of limitation laws, and Fiore was able to return to his homeland in April 1999.

He had already founded Forza Nuova, an anti-immigration party committed to revoking laws that ban the recreation of the fascist party. A year after his return he was quoted as saying: "If you call me a neo-fascist I won't kick up a fuss."

Guardian

Property investment for fascists - the Croatia story continues

An article in a national newspaper last Sunday (22 July), and reproduced all over the internet, claimed to reveal how BNP leaders were setting up a self-sufficient rural bolthole in Croatia in preparation for when the oil runs out.

In fact the story, which was full of errors, was the result of an attempt by the BNP to build a smokescreen around some plain old-fashioned property speculation.

Last October Nick Griffin, the BNP leader, was a guest speaker at a well attended meeting of the party's Leeds branch. He normally turns up in a suit, but on this occasion he made his excuses for wearing jeans, saying that he had just returned from a visit to Croatia. He then regaled his audience about the ethnic problems following the break-up of the former Yugoslavia.

What Griffin did not mention was that much of the "ethnic cleansing" in Croatia at the start of the 1990s, consisting of torture, rape, murder and mutilation of bodies, was carried out by the reborn Ustasha movement. Some 50 years earlier the Ustashi had carried out their first attempt at genocide, in conjunction with the Nazis, against Serbs, Jews and Roma. More than a million Serbs of all ages were butchered in their homes, in forests and in concentration camps. Another 250,000 were forcibly converted to Catholicism, and around a further 300,000 were driven out of Croatia into the remote mountain areas of Serbia.

Hero worship of the wartime butchers of the Ustashi remains widespread in Croatia and it is one of the areas of eastern Europe in which Roberto Fiore, the Italian third-positionist fascist and long-term friend of Griffin, has taken an interest in recent years.

Griffin's visit to Croatia inevitably gave rise to speculation in the BNP, especially when news started to leak out about at least one other senior BNP officer visiting the country, about a property purchase there and even offshore bank accounts to shift BNP funds into the new project.

Older BNP members recalled with dismay two earlier overseas property ventures involving Fiore. The first was a ruined hamlet in northern France in the days when Griffin led the National Front Political Soldiers. A member of Fiore's family had their name on the title deeds and volunteers were shipped out to try to turn it into a political commune. The project was eventually abandoned, money raised from British supporters poured down the drain.

A decade later Fiore bought an abandoned village in Spain. Again work on making it habitable was carried out by volunteers, now from the successor group to the Political Soldiers, the International Third Position.

Yet again it flopped and Fiore had to rush in a lawyer to bail out a leading member of the ITP who had been thrown into jail for attacking the local mayor's property. Back in England the man was given a job in Fiore's extensive UK property empire. The project vanished.

And one must not forget how Griffin got Young NF members to work free of charge to convert a barn at his parents' property in Suffolk in the mid 1980s and later got the BNP to pay for renovation of a barn on his farm in Wales.

BNP members are not keen to see the party's hard-earned funds squandered on yet another potentially disastrous property venture. The BNP is not a party where people can freely ask awkward questions of their leader and get honest answers, so instead disgruntled members started leaking bits of interesting information about the Croatian plans to the anti-fascist Lancaster UAF blogsite.

This could not have come at a worse time for Griffin, who is currently facing a leadership election in the BNP. A huge amount of dirty linen has been paraded before the public in the past six weeks, including talk about property in Croatia.

Knowing that the story was likely to break beyond the anti-fascist movement, Griffin engaged in a classic manoeuvre to control the situation by orchestrating the delivery of a "scoop" to a national newspaper. Anti-fascist blogs and others immediately reproduced it, though Kirklees Unity soon removed it after realising that the story was riddled with errors and half truths and was just an attempt to divert attention from Griffin's property venture.

The story claimed that Andrew McKillop, an expert on "peak oil" – the theory that the world's oil reserves are about to run out – briefed the BNP leadership last September at a secret weekend meeting at a hotel in Hampshire. Those present were so concerned about this that they decided to buy 1,100 hectares of land in Croatia as a bolthole for when civilisation breaks down, the story continued.

But there were many errors.

The story quotes McKillop saying that he had only been contacted via the internet to give the presentation in the New Forest, giving the impression he has had little to do with the BNP. In fact Griffin has reproduced and promoted McKillop's articles on the BNP website and they have been published in the BNP's monthly magazine, Identity.

McKillop was also invited to join the BNP's shadowy think tank, which Searchlight exposed in March. The story says McKillop lives in the USA. When we spoke to him earlier this year he was living in Paris.

Another man named in the story is the BNP's economics expert Alan Goodacre. The writer seemed to think he uses the name Ian Fletcher when visiting the USA. In fact Ian Fletcher is a well known US rightwinger who lobbies against migrant workers. They are not the same person. For one thing an expert analysis of their articles show that Goodacre writes in British English whereas Fletcher is very definitely a North American.

One of the story's most obvious errors is the description of Lee Barnes as the BNP's second-in-command. Far from it: although Barnes acts as the director of the BNP's legal department, he is not actually a party member. This enables him to front up various money raising schemes for the BNP from which the party prefers to distance itself.

Griffin's deputy is Simon Darby and the party's vice-chair is Scott McLean.

The story claims the land is owned by a BNP sympathiser whose late father "is understood to have made a fortune in the pizza business". No name is given and the story sounds a bit like it is based on the pizza billionaire who funds a community in the USA.

The article ends with an obvious bit of padding, with a rapid trawl through the bombers Tim McVeigh and David Copeland and William Pierce's The Turner Diaries.

It is interesting that the BNP chose to dump this story on a journalist who does not have a track record of writing about the far right but works for a newspaper that is very keen on ecology.

The very worthwhile team at Lancaster UAF are to be congratulated on opening up a can of worms which the BNP leader will have great difficulty closing.

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