Gerd Honsik was sentenced to five years in prison by a Vienna
court that found him guilty of "Wiederbetätigung"— "reengaging" in
Nazi era beliefs. The crime is punishable by up to 20 years in prison.
While living in Spain from the early 1990s to evade a previous
Austrian prison sentence, Honsik published several articles disputing
that the Nazis killed millions of Jews at Auschwitz and other concentration
camps during World War II. Honsik, 67 who wrote the book Acquittal
for Hitler? in 1988, defended himself by arguing that he did not
deny the existence of all the gas chambers in Nazi concentration camps.
Authorities arrested Honsik in Spain in October 2007 and subsequently
extradited him.
After his lawyer, Herbert Schaller, pointed out that it was not onsik
but "fine and righteous foreigners" who had first denied the existence
of gas chambers, the prosecutor said he would consider whether to also
indict Schaller under Austria's law banning National Socialist activities.
In 1992, an Austrian court passed an 18-month prison term against
Honsik for denying the crimes committed by Hitler's regime. Before starting
his sentence, Honsik fled to Spain, but he was eventually extradited
in 2007. Both the prosecution and the defendant plan to appeal the verdict
and sentence, Austrian press agency reported. The public prosecutor
found the sentence too mild.
Austria has the most repressive laws limiting freedom of expression
with regard to the Holocaust story in Europe. For updates on the
Honsik case, see: http://www.gerd-honsik.net/
"Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime IS death."
George Orwell