The extremist Golden Dawn party is under pressure after Pavlos Fissas, a 45-year-old rap musician and anti-racism campaigner, was murdered by one of the party's supporters. Government minister Nikos Dendias suggested a law that could block state funding for Golden Dawn if police find organizational links to crime, which caused outrage across Greece. Authorities are currently checking Golden Dawn lawmakers' phone records as part of their investigation into the murder of Fissas.
Dendias proposed legislation that would cut off state funding to parties if their leader or more than a tenth of their lawmakers are charged with a felony carrying a ten-year prison term, according to the 'Reuters' news agency. Greek parties receive state funding when they achieve parliamentary representation, based on their popular vote.
Greece's high court and an anti-terrorism police unit have already begun investigating whether Golden Dawn, which has 18 members of parliament, has been involved in a string of violent attacks over the past two years and is a criminal organization, officials have said. Police carried out 13 raids on Golden Dawn offices, the party's newspaper said on its website on Saturday.
As calls for a ban of the party grow louder, Dendias told a Sunday newspaper that outlawing Golden Dawn would require a constitutional change, a process that could take years. "The time may have come to debate that possibility," he said.
In opinion polls, Golden Dawn lost popular support following the murder and the debate about its involvement in it. The party, whose banner has been likened to that of the Nazi Party, claims it had nothing to do with the killing and has accused the government and media of a "witch hunt" to rob it of votes.
The Greek Jewish community umbrella body KIS reacted with outrage at the murder of Fissas. In a statement released on Monday, KIS urged Prime Minister Antonis Samaras and the leaders of all democratic parties to work against the resurgence of Nazism in Greece, and to honor their pledge to introduce "strong and effective legislation that will combat racism, intolerance and anti-Semitism." KIS also demanded that parties that deploy "Nazi methods" and which "have committed crimes against democracy and society" be banned from contesting elections. The Jewish leaders said all parties now had to "turn their promises into legislative actions and finally stop those who seek a return of the darkest period of our history."