Bela Ewald Althans | |
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| Born | (1966-03-23)23 March 1966 (age 59) Bremen, Germany |
| Other names | Bernd Althans |
| Known for | Neo-Nazism |
Bela Ewald Althans (born 23 March 1966) is a German formerneo-Nazi. Once the leading organiser in Germany's neo-Nazi underground, Althans left the movement following his imprisonment in the 1990s, and is no longer involved in politics.
Althans was born into a middle-class family inBremen[1][2] where he was taught to rejectNazism but nonetheless became involved in neo-Nazi groups from the age of thirteen.[1] He became a follower ofMichael Kühnen and led theHanover branchAction Front of National Socialists/National Activists until it was banned in 1983.[1] He was also a member of theNeo-Nazi organizationWiking-Jugend.[3] Following Kühnen's imprisonment, by which time Althans had been thrown out of the family home by his parents and also his school, Althans went to live withOtto Ernst Remer inBad Kissingen.[1] Remer made Althans the youth leader of the Freedom Movement, a group that Remer had founded, and taught him about organising cell-based movements as well as introducing him to a number of leading figures of neo-Nazism internationally.[4] In 1988, Althans spent several months in the United States, where he worked closely withTom Metzger, appearing on his radio show, where they discussed their mutual admiration for theantisemitism ofNation of Islam leaderLouis Farrakhan.[5]
On 20 April 1990, Althans organised aHolocaust denial conclave in theLöwenbräukeller in Munich at which the guest of honour wasDavid Irving. The evening consisted of both speeches and performances mockingthe Holocaust.[6] By this time Althans had broken from Remer, leading to personal bitterness between the two, and he sought to develop his own profile internationally, working closely withYvan Blot in France andCEDADE in Spain.[7] Within Germany Althans, working withChristian Worch, sought to expand neo-Nazi operations be it through working in secret with less underground groups that officially disavowed Nazism like theNational Democratic Party of Germany and theGerman People's Union, reuniting the pro- and anti-Kühnen factions after his death, or building stronger organisational bases in the formerEast Germany.[8] Althans also allied himself to theInstitute for Historical Review and attended a number of their conferences.[9]
In the early 1990s, Althans emerged as a press representative for German neo-Nazism, taking advantage of his rhetoric, which allowed him to seem sophisticated, his imposing personal appearance (6 feet, 4 inches tall) and his fluency inFrench andEnglish.[10] At the time, he had his own office in a high-end district ofMunich with a picture ofAdolf Hitler displayed in the window.[10] Althans used computers to organise hate group events disguised as protests, with one example being theRostock-Lichtenhagen riots, which were violent andxenophobicriots. They were the worst mob attacks againstmigrants in postwar Germany, although no one was killed. Stones andpetrol bombs were thrown at an apartment block where refugees lived.
Althans began to look for new allies inEastern Europe and spoke at events for the veterans of the14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Ukrainian) inUkraine in 1993, whilst also making trips toRussia to open contact withRussian National Unity leaderAlexander Barkashov.[11] Althans' journeys were mostly funded by Holocaust denierErnst Zündel and the two went to Russia together in August 1994 where relations with Barkashov and otherfar right leaders were cemented.[12] The pair also metVladimir Zhirinovsky, although Althans was unimpressed with theLiberal Democratic Party of Russia leader, suggesting that Zhirinovsky's anti-Semitism was merely opportunistic rather than ideological like his own.[13] Althans later said that Zündel was paying him 16,000 Deutsch Marks a month: "I was suddenly rich. Before that I had nothing. Now I had everything. It was a great job for a provocateur."[14]
Althans and Zündel was interviewed and their activism and daily private lives documented on the depth bySwedish Television SVT in one show of the investigative documentary programDokument utifrån, episodeYrke Nynazist ("Occupation: Neonazi") which aired on 20 August 1994 and caused some controversy in both Sweden and some cities in Germany that refused to show it since it contains scenes where Althans and Zündel promote Nazism openly without interruptions or counter-comments. In the documentary, Althans also publicly shows support for the Croatian Ustaša movement.[15]
In December 1994, Althans was imprisoned for distributing a video that denied the Holocaust and, whilst still in jail, faced further charges relating to disrespectful comments he made in a documentary about him,Beruf Neonazi, claiming thatAuschwitz concentration camp was little more than a holiday resort, despite how horrific it was in reality. During the trial Althans attempted to defend himself by claiming that he had renounced neo-Nazism and had been an agent for theVerfassungsschutz since 1991—Althans later said: "It was a rumour placed in [a weekly news magazine] by a friend. It was meant to help me. But it wasn't true and the judge was too clever for that. He saw through it"[14]—whilst also getting witnesses to testify that he wasbisexual.[16]
On 10 July 1995,Der Spiegel reported that Althans had been working for theBavarian Intelligence agency, until the collaboration had been terminated by the agency because of "lack of truthfulness of reports".[17] During the Althans trial atBerlin Regional Court, Bavarian intelligence chief Gerhard Forster on 1 August 1995 deniedDer Spiegel's allegations, but admitted to two meetings of intelligence officials with Althans in 1994. During a first meeting on 23 February 1994, Althans offered "extensive files" on the German neofascist scene for a sum of DEM 360,000. During a second meeting on 10 March 1994, this offer was rejected by the intelligence officials.[18][19]
Ultimately his defence failed and he had an additional3+1⁄2-years added to the sentence he was already serving.[20]
Althans, who subsequently acknowledged his homosexuality and married his Taiwanese boyfriend,[14] left the neo-Nazi movement following his release and disappeared altogether, later being reported as living under a new identity in Belgium.[2] He subsequently gave his private papers from his neo-Nazi days to theInternational Institute of Social History inAmsterdam.[21][14] At the time of a January 2022 interview withJay Rayner for the LondonObserver, he was living in Berlin and active in the gay scene. Althans said his journey away from the far right "wasn't some sudden change. It was over time... I am a provocateur, always have been".[14]
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)| International | |
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