Nikos Michaloliakos, the founder and leader of Greece’s neo-Nazi organization Golden Dawn, has been released from prison after citing health reasons. He had been serving a sentence of 13 years and six months for leading a criminal organization, but a court in the city of Lamia ruled on Friday that the remainder of his sentence will be served under house arrest. As part of the conditions, he must report once a month to a police station for the next three years.
The decision comes just a year after another Lamia court annulled his earlier conditional release. Golden Dawn, once the third-largest party in the Greek parliament, was declared a criminal organization in 2020 after a landmark trial that found its leadership guilty of directing violent attacks, including the 2013 murder of anti-fascist rapper Pavlos Fyssas.
News of Michaloliakos’ release has provoked outrage. Magda Fyssa, the mother of Pavlos, reacted with fury in a televised interview, calling the ruling an insult to justice. “Fascists are out, while those who stand in solidarity are in prison. Murderers are free, and the ones who resist are punished,” she said, visibly shaken, just days before the twelfth anniversary of her son’s killing.
Commemorations for Fyssas are already underway. The cultural association named in his memory, “Pavlos Killah P Fyssas,” has announced a series of antifascist events this September, including a large open-air concert in the working-class district of Drapetsona and a memorial gathering in Keratsini at the site where he was murdered.
The release has also drawn strong condemnation from the political left. The Communist Party of Greece demanded that the ruling be overturned, describing it as “unacceptable” and accusing the justice system of showing leniency to convicted Golden Dawn members while targeting workers and grassroots movements. The recently formed New Left party said the decision was “a serious blow to collective memory and to the fight for democracy and justice,” pledging to continue confronting fascism in all its forms.
