Gerd Honsik

Gerd Honsik (born 10 October 1941 in Vienna) is an Austrian writer and lyric poet, and a prominent Holocaust denier.^[1]

Life

Honsik was a functionary in the Austrian "Volksbewegung"^[2] ("People's Movement"), also known as "Volksbewegung gegen Überfremdung" ("People's Movement against Foreign Infiltration") and "Ausländer-Halt-Bewegung" ("No More Foreigners Movement"),^[3] as well as in Austria's far-right NDP party.^[2] He was the founder of a militia group, the Nationale Front, which according to its manifesto carried out activities to effect "the abolition of the system".^[4][5]

He has also appeared under the pseudonym "Gerhon Endsik",^[6] an anagram of the syllables of his name extended by two letters, intended to allude to the (politically charged) German term Endsieg ("final victory").

Honsik has been fined and sentenced to jail in several Austrian court cases due to his activities as a Holocaust denier.^[2] He evaded his most recent sentence by fleeing the country,^[7] and residing in Spain until 24 August 2007^[8] when he was arrested in Málaga^[9] after a recent change in Spanish legislation. On the 4th of October 2007^[10] Honsik was extradited to Austria to serve out an 18-month prison sentence stemming from a 1992 conviction for Holocaust denial.^[7] Spain had previously refused requests to extradite Honsik because Holocaust denial and neo-Nazi propaganda were not illegal in that country. Honsik was only extradited after two European-wide arrest warrants were issued at Austria's request.^[11]

While in Spain Honsik contributed to the magazine Halt ("Stop") at irregular intervals.^[12] The magazine publishes Holocaust-denying and anti-Semitic articles. Honsik also wrote a book, "Hitler Innocent?",^[13] in which he attempts to justify some Nazi-era crimes.

On 27 April 2009, Honsik was sentenced to five years in prison in Austria for propagating Holocaust denial,^[14] later reduced to four years.^[15] The prosecutor argued that Honsik is "one of the ideological leaders" of Europe's neo-Nazi movement and that his distribution of "hate magazines" at schools violated Austrian law. During the trial, Honsik called himself "a social democrat" and stated that he only "rejected the textbook wisdom that demonizes National Socialism" and he only denied the existence of the gas chambers used in concentration camps "wherever I had not verified the (facts) myself". At one point, Honsik began screaming and pounding his fists after the judge denied his requests to introduce evidence which the court had deemed irrelevant.^[11]

Honsik denied the charges and said he would appeal the verdict; the prosecutor stated that he also would appeal to seek a longer jail-term of up to 20 years.^[11]

Notes

Much of this article is translated from the German wikipedia article of March 5th 2007