ATHENS 

Greece’s left-wing SYRIZA party on Tuesday accused the government of tolerating violence by far-right criminals.

“The brazen far-right thugs who do not dare to mess with someone of their own stature attack a weak individual. This is the strategy of fascism,” said Elena Akrita, the party’s lawmaker responsible for rights and equality.

The statement was in response to the video appearing on Greek social media showing a 10-year-old children in the city of Gumulcine (Komotini), where a significant number of ethnic Turks live, being humiliated and threatened by some to call the name of convicted leader of neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, Ilias Kasidiaris.

“All this, unfortunately, is happening with the tolerance of the government of Kyriakos Mitsotakis,” she said, adding: “We will fight until they leave our lives, and send them (fascists) where they belong, in the stinking sewer of history.”

Ilias Kasidiaris Kasidiaris was arrested in 2013 along with a number of other Golden Dawn lawmakers on charges of belonging to a criminal organization. In 2020, he was sentenced to 13 years in prison for his role in the banned party.