Greece’s counter-terrorism squad arrested on Tuesday six men suspected of participating in a far-right criminal group called “Combat 18 Hellas”, and of involvement in arson attacks and explosions.
Police said in a statement they raided eight homes, six in Athens and two in other cities, and confiscated petrol bombs, knives, hunting rifles and material that can be used to make explosives.
They also found digital evidence, books, leaflets and flags with far-right symbols.
One police official said the five men were suspected members of the “Combat 18 Hellas” group. They are expected to appear before a prosecutor on Wednesday.
Greece has a long history of political violence. It experienced a rise in attacks by suspected far-right groups at the height of the country’s financial crisis, its worst in decades, which started in 2010 and has caused the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs.
Combat 18 is a group that emerged in the UK in the early 1990s with a clear neo-Nazi stigma and known for attacks against immigrants. The name of the group was inspired by the name of Adolf Hitler himself, as “18” refers to the first and eighth letters of the German alphabet, “A” and “H”, ie the initials of Hitler.