The Greek Parliament, after long delays, has adopted amendments to make stricter prosecution of manifestations of homophobia and racism possible and to criminalize Holocaust denial and the perpetration of crimes against humanity. Agence-France Presse reported on 10 September that Athens has long been under pressure from the EU to adopt such norms.
Greece was included on a January list of 13 Member States the European Commission says do not criminalize such behavior. Greece has found itself under increased pressure to do so ever since the upturn in the number of right-wing extremists with the Golden Dawn party, which has become the third-strongest party in Parliament, and ever since a significant increase in the number of assaults perpetrated against immigrants and persons of other faiths or political convictions in Greece.
Neo-Nazis in particular are charged with responsibility for most of those attacks. All of the Golden Dawn’s MPs are already being criminally prosecuted by the Greek authorities for organizing violence.
The law increases the punishment for such crimes from two to three years in prison and institutes fines of up to EUR 20 000. Parliament has been reviewing the amendment to the 1979 law since last May and postponed its discussion three times in response to commentary from the governing conservative New Democracy party.
In addition to the question of the Holocaust, New Democracy MPs also wanted to criminalize denial of the genocide of the Armenians and the Greeks perpetrated at the start of the 20th century by the Ottoman Turks. Some conservatives also objected to combating assaults against gay people.
Greece remains under the influence of the still-strong Orthodox Church. That institution is still significantly conservative regarding such questions.
