In Germany, a former extreme-left activist turned neo-Nazi has been sentenced to six years in prison for calling the Holocaust "the biggest lie in history." Horst Mahler, who in the 1970s co-founded the militant far-left Red Army Faction (RAF) and later swung violently far-right, was convicted of inciting racial hatred by the higher regional court in the southern city of Munich. The now 73-year-old on several occasions vehemently disputed the Nazis had systematically exterminated six million European Jews during World War II. Denying the Holocaust is a crime in Germany. Mahler was also found to have distributed offensive CDs and a book by convicted Holocaust denier Germar Rudolf.
The court said the only mitigating factor in Mahler's case was his advanced age. "Adding to the severity of his sentence were the defendant's unreasonable and intransigent stance as well as the public attention he intentionally drew to his behavior," the judge said in a statement. Mahler, who was immediately taken into custody, has a string of convictions for similar offences as well as for crimes dating back to his time with the RAF, which carried out a bloody campaign against the West German government.
Last April, he was convicted for giving a Hitler salute to a Jewish journalist in an interview and denying the Holocaust. He has also praised the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States and has accused Jews of seeking "world domination".
