Prior to the January 25th general elections, the far-right party had 16 lawmakers in parliament, while after the elections 13 lawmakers were re-elected.
Press reports note that a specific date for the trial has not yet been set but it is expected that it will take place soon. If convicted, some members of the party could face up to 20 years in prison.
On its part, GD denies all the allegations and maintains that they are victims of a political witch-hunt.
At present, and following the recent elections, Golden Dawn is the third largest political party in Greece and currently holds 17 seats in Greece's 300-seat parliament.
In November, 2014, Golden Dawn's New York chapter translated an interview that was published in the To Paron newspaper (“Παρόν”), where the paper's editor Makis Kouris, interviewed Elias Kassidiaris.
This is that interview (more at GD's newssite by clicking HERE):
TO PARON - All these months you and your leader have been in prison, have you ever thought about the provocations you have made towards citizens for the weapons you were carrying, the evidence the authorities used to press charges against you?
Kassidiaris: There is no legislation that can prosecute someone for having “provocative behavior” nor for being photographed having a licensed rifle with a permit. The two prosecuting judges who pressed charges against us are the puppets of the Samaras government. This is not just my personal opinion, it’s been said by Samaras’ own right hand man Panagiotis Baltakos. Unfortunately, Baltakos has revealed the disregard for the constitution and mockery of justice is in relation to stopping the rise of SYRIZA! According to the prosecutor, even though I didn’t commit a crime, he says I might have given my rifle to someone else in order to commit crimes. Imagine how ridiculous this is! My reasonable argument was that the rifle is in my name so if a crime was committed, I would have been the main suspect. Their response to that was unbelievable! They said the unknown persons may not have to shoot my rifle, but they could use it in order to “break the morale” of our opponents. Also, other grounds they used for my trial detention is that the rifle has plastic parts and it can be used in times of war.
TO PARON - Why did you keep videos and photos from your training with weapons? No other political party trains with weapons.
Kassidiaris: I’ve never appeared in any training camp or military demonstrations like the minister of New Democracy Papadopoulos did, escorted by armed men in uniforms. I have seen Liana Kanelli (Greek Communist Party) Mr Papoulias and Mr Avramopoulos shoot even with fully automatic military grade machine guns. I have also seen organized members of the communist party trained in martial arts under the veil of “party activities”. Every single weapon that I possess has been fully licensed and registered by the Greek police. I’ve participating officially in shooting sports since 1999 and all these activities are within the law.
TO PARON - The decision from the judges is that all of them have agreed with each other to put you in jail. Is it possible councils prosecutors investigators to obay orders from Samaras and Venizelos?
Kassidiaris: This is a huge lie, we never said it was all the judges, we named specific judges and officials who give a bad name to judges as a whole. When the justice minister admits in the parliament that he made a phone call to the head prosecutor Mrs. Tsami, during the interrogation of Nikolaos Michaloliakos, just imagine how the government intervenes in the ministry of justice. Unfortunately, in Greece the courts are mortally wounded by a corrupt political system. That is why the thieves instead of being in prison are instead inside the house of parliament and voting for fatal memorandums.
TO PARON - You dont take responsibility for anything?
Kassidiaris: I take full responsibility for any of my own actions, of course I have made some mistakes. Mistakes however are made by people who do something, not nothing. However if you consider it a crime to slap Liana Kanelli, this was simply in response to her abusive attack.
TO PARON - If tomorrow you came out of prison would you use the same tactics as in Meligalas, Thermopiles, attacks against immigrant street vendors or with the assasination of Pavlos Fyssas?
Kassidiaris: The parade in Meligalas was a big miscommunication, it was my own initiative done spontaneously, if you watch the video carefully you will see that we are not a paramilitary organization because the crowd was not matching in lockstep. The ceremony at Thermopiles was by my own direction, some say that it was too much, but if you hear the lyrics of Simonidis for Leonidas and the 300. It was inspired from the Greek antiquity. I cannot find something wrong with this in the final analysis.
-Our actions against the black market in Rafina and Messolongi were symbolic and no people were harmed. We never attacked vendors, just some cardboard boxes that were crushed on the ground.
-Our parliament member Kostas Barbarousis who has accused for this along with some other Golden Dawn members have all been triumphantly found innocent in court. No newspapers or press mentioned anything about this! The hand which assassinated Fyssas did the same thing to assassinate Golden Dawn politically. From the very first moment we have condemned the crime while at the same time in the presidential house they were celebrating because they found an opportunity to attack Golden Dawn.
This is the darkest murder in the last decades of the new regime. The man who is called the killer of Keratsini, named Dimou is running free. The video tape from a store nearby was never taken by the police. It seems 10 days after the murder that the chief of the Greek police Papagianopoulos asked for the tape but never received it because the tape was erased and it could not be recovered again. According to the initial testimonies of the police officers at the crime scene, it was just the killer, the victim and 4 police officers from the “Dias” squad. “Dias” squad never intervened and let two citizens kill each other!
TO PARON - Now that we have elections for the president of the republic, if they don’t allow you to get out of jail to vote, will you resign alongside all your fellow candidates?
Kassidiaris: The constitution is treated like it does not exist anymore. That is obvious but nobody from the so called “democrats” say anything about it. If they try to elect a president with less than 180 votes we will automatically walk out and we will lead the country into elections.
TO PARON - At the trial, if the court does not permit live media coverage how you will react?
Kassidiaris: Probably there will be no trial for us because they don't have anything on us, but if they do so we will demand immediate coverage. That is the only way for the people to learn and understand the political conspiracy that is taking place against the third largest political force in this country. We have already appealed to the European court of human rights and dozens of nationalist European parliament members will come to Athens as witnesses to observe.
TO PARON - How do you explain the fact that two of your European parliament members have not used your terminology and never created problems in the EU Parliament as you have done in the past in the Greek parliament? Why haven’t we seen them in training camps?
Kassidiaris: First of all we have 3 European Parliament members, not 2. All Three parliament members follow the official line of the Golden Dawn. We have stated over 1000 questions for which nobody answers anything. Our parliament members happened not to have Venizelos standing across from them to insult and provoke them like I did when questioning him about the Lagarde list. I keep saying that there are no exercise camps. For the innocent stupidity of the past from 10 years ago you have the right to judge me on a personal level, but everyone did stupid things when they were younger and this is not a crime.
TO PARON - Have you any regrets? If you were starting now would you use the same tactics?
Kassidiaris: We would have followed the exact same strategy that in September of 2013 got us to 20%. We would have avoided some communication mistakes, but we would have raised our voice again and again. The strong and loud voice of Golden Dawn is the only thing that scares the corrupted thieves. The same things we said before we went into the parliament, were also said once we were inside the parliament. If you refer to episodes like the slap with Kanelli and the stands in the street market I suggest instead you take a look at Venizelos and the submarines, PASOK black market sales, Athanasiou’s tampering with the justice system , the Lagarde list with big names, Karatzaferis and his off-shore companies and the great scandals from the last 30 years of “democracy” for which no one ever went to prison!
TO PARON - What was your first task when you entered the parliament?
Kassidiaris: To fight for national sovereignty and independence, to set our country free from international money lenders, to rebuild our nation on the basis of the Greek family for the Greek people to live in a free nation.
TO PARON - How do you explain why the percentage of Golden Dawn is slipping?
Kassidiaris: You are not well informed, according to professor Panas’ predictions our percentages are rising. The system exit poll companies failed miserably in the previous European elections to predict with any accuracy our election percentage. Although half of the MPs are in jail and the rest under house arrest we keep fighting and in the end we will be the final winners.
TO PARON - How do you spend your time in jail? Are you reading any books? When you joined Golden Dawn and you shared the same beliefs with Nikolaos Michaloliakos did you ever think that it would come to this?
Kassidiaris: There is no worse thing than to live an innocent life in prison. Although I have managed to improve on a great scale my physical and mental condition and to maintain excellent psychology. This period is temporary and quite soon will end. I exercise and I study many hours everyday. I read mostly historic and philosophical books. I have completed a book about historical events and now I am writing my second book which will be a political book this time. This is the conspiracy against Golden Dawn from the first days in parliament until the present. When I joined Nikolaos Michaloliakos in this pure fight I knew that the higher we reach the greater the risks. We knew that the thieves will not go to prison voluntarily or confess their crimes. Now they have put us in jail but i am absolutely certain that Golden Dawn will empowered through all this conspiracy and will continue to struggle in a total war declared to the corrupt political system!