July 25, 2007

Property investment for fascists - the Croatia story continues

An article in a national newspaper last Sunday (22 July), and reproduced all over the internet, claimed to reveal how BNP leaders were setting up a self-sufficient rural bolthole in Croatia in preparation for when the oil runs out.

In fact the story, which was full of errors, was the result of an attempt by the BNP to build a smokescreen around some plain old-fashioned property speculation.

Last October Nick Griffin, the BNP leader, was a guest speaker at a well attended meeting of the party's Leeds branch. He normally turns up in a suit, but on this occasion he made his excuses for wearing jeans, saying that he had just returned from a visit to Croatia. He then regaled his audience about the ethnic problems following the break-up of the former Yugoslavia.

What Griffin did not mention was that much of the "ethnic cleansing" in Croatia at the start of the 1990s, consisting of torture, rape, murder and mutilation of bodies, was carried out by the reborn Ustasha movement. Some 50 years earlier the Ustashi had carried out their first attempt at genocide, in conjunction with the Nazis, against Serbs, Jews and Roma. More than a million Serbs of all ages were butchered in their homes, in forests and in concentration camps. Another 250,000 were forcibly converted to Catholicism, and around a further 300,000 were driven out of Croatia into the remote mountain areas of Serbia.

Hero worship of the wartime butchers of the Ustashi remains widespread in Croatia and it is one of the areas of eastern Europe in which Roberto Fiore, the Italian third-positionist fascist and long-term friend of Griffin, has taken an interest in recent years.

Griffin's visit to Croatia inevitably gave rise to speculation in the BNP, especially when news started to leak out about at least one other senior BNP officer visiting the country, about a property purchase there and even offshore bank accounts to shift BNP funds into the new project.

Older BNP members recalled with dismay two earlier overseas property ventures involving Fiore. The first was a ruined hamlet in northern France in the days when Griffin led the National Front Political Soldiers. A member of Fiore's family had their name on the title deeds and volunteers were shipped out to try to turn it into a political commune. The project was eventually abandoned, money raised from British supporters poured down the drain.

A decade later Fiore bought an abandoned village in Spain. Again work on making it habitable was carried out by volunteers, now from the successor group to the Political Soldiers, the International Third Position.

Yet again it flopped and Fiore had to rush in a lawyer to bail out a leading member of the ITP who had been thrown into jail for attacking the local mayor's property. Back in England the man was given a job in Fiore's extensive UK property empire. The project vanished.

And one must not forget how Griffin got Young NF members to work free of charge to convert a barn at his parents' property in Suffolk in the mid 1980s and later got the BNP to pay for renovation of a barn on his farm in Wales.

BNP members are not keen to see the party's hard-earned funds squandered on yet another potentially disastrous property venture. The BNP is not a party where people can freely ask awkward questions of their leader and get honest answers, so instead disgruntled members started leaking bits of interesting information about the Croatian plans to the anti-fascist Lancaster UAF blogsite.

This could not have come at a worse time for Griffin, who is currently facing a leadership election in the BNP. A huge amount of dirty linen has been paraded before the public in the past six weeks, including talk about property in Croatia.

Knowing that the story was likely to break beyond the anti-fascist movement, Griffin engaged in a classic manoeuvre to control the situation by orchestrating the delivery of a "scoop" to a national newspaper. Anti-fascist blogs and others immediately reproduced it, though Kirklees Unity soon removed it after realising that the story was riddled with errors and half truths and was just an attempt to divert attention from Griffin's property venture.

The story claimed that Andrew McKillop, an expert on "peak oil" – the theory that the world's oil reserves are about to run out – briefed the BNP leadership last September at a secret weekend meeting at a hotel in Hampshire. Those present were so concerned about this that they decided to buy 1,100 hectares of land in Croatia as a bolthole for when civilisation breaks down, the story continued.

But there were many errors.

The story quotes McKillop saying that he had only been contacted via the internet to give the presentation in the New Forest, giving the impression he has had little to do with the BNP. In fact Griffin has reproduced and promoted McKillop's articles on the BNP website and they have been published in the BNP's monthly magazine, Identity.

McKillop was also invited to join the BNP's shadowy think tank, which Searchlight exposed in March. The story says McKillop lives in the USA. When we spoke to him earlier this year he was living in Paris.

Another man named in the story is the BNP's economics expert Alan Goodacre. The writer seemed to think he uses the name Ian Fletcher when visiting the USA. In fact Ian Fletcher is a well known US rightwinger who lobbies against migrant workers. They are not the same person. For one thing an expert analysis of their articles show that Goodacre writes in British English whereas Fletcher is very definitely a North American.

One of the story's most obvious errors is the description of Lee Barnes as the BNP's second-in-command. Far from it: although Barnes acts as the director of the BNP's legal department, he is not actually a party member. This enables him to front up various money raising schemes for the BNP from which the party prefers to distance itself.

Griffin's deputy is Simon Darby and the party's vice-chair is Scott McLean.

The story claims the land is owned by a BNP sympathiser whose late father "is understood to have made a fortune in the pizza business". No name is given and the story sounds a bit like it is based on the pizza billionaire who funds a community in the USA.

The article ends with an obvious bit of padding, with a rapid trawl through the bombers Tim McVeigh and David Copeland and William Pierce's The Turner Diaries.

It is interesting that the BNP chose to dump this story on a journalist who does not have a track record of writing about the far right but works for a newspaper that is very keen on ecology.

The very worthwhile team at Lancaster UAF are to be congratulated on opening up a can of worms which the BNP leader will have great difficulty closing.

Stop the BNP

21 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thank God for that - that item oputs the story back on the right tracks.
"The very worthwhile team at Lancaster UAF are to be congratulated"
Excellent plug for you guys and well deserved.

Anonymous said...

"Older BNP members recalled with dismay two earlier overseas property ventures involving Fiore. The first was a ruined hamlet in northern France in the days when Griffin led the National Front Political Soldiers. A member of Fiore's family had their name on the title deeds and volunteers were shipped out to try to turn it into a political commune. The project was eventually abandoned, money raised from British supporters poured down the drain.

A decade later Fiore bought an abandoned village in Spain. Again work on making it habitable was carried out by volunteers, now from the successor group to the Political Soldiers, the International Third Position."

As you mentioned a few days ago, this is not the first time Nick griffin has been involved in these mysterious ventures into Europe. I wonder how this would work if the BNP suddenly and mysteriously gained power and withdrew from the EU?

Anonymous said...

"Congratulated"!

What for?

They have been led by the nose.

Suckers!

Anonymous said...

"I wonder how this would work if the BNP suddenly and mysteriously gained power and withdrew from the EU? "

The BNP mouths what the disgruntled public want to hear.

The BNP has no intention of pulling out of Europe and Griffin could earn a £million a year if he got elected. Do you really think the greedy bastard would give that up?

Antifascist said...

'They have been led by the nose. Suckers!'

Nervous, are you? We know we're on the right track and every day sees a new snippet of good information coming in. The only people being led by the nose are the poor silly bastards who joined the BNP believing that it was a party with integrity. They'll learn.

Anonymous said...

This Roberto Fiore geezer seems to be popular with Nick Griffin. Could it be because hes got pots of money?

Anonymous said...

"Could it be because hes got pots of money?"
That's the only reason Nick Griffin tolerates anyone.

Anonymous said...

I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that BNP members are just suckers waiting for a shyster to come along and rip them off, just so they can roll over and let him.

Anonymous said...

"I'm rapidly coming to the conclusion that BNP members are just suckers waiting for a shyster to come along and rip them off, just so they can roll over and let him."
Nick Griffins got the party he wants then hasn't he. Bunch of fuckwits.

Anonymous said...

Griffin will always be in control of the BNP until his bitchy daughter takes over in 20 years time. It is his own personal family plaything.

Anonymous said...

More lying CRAP from the BNP and a man who is 2 years late with the Great White Records accounts.




Originally Posted by David Hannam
Dear All,

What the commission are saying is essentially unfair.

The BNP pays big money to have both our accounting units audited and inspected.

In fact, this year, because the Regional Accounting Unit fell under the £250,000 turnover threshold, (£250,000 and over accounts have to be audited by law) we didn't even have to have our accounts audited, but, in the interests of transparency we decided to pay for an inspected regional audit anyway. This is separate to the central audit with a higher turnover, which has already been submitted to the Auditor.

All accounts have been submitted to the Party Independent Auditor, and we are waiting on the company to make the final submission to the electoral commission.

There have been vast improvements in regards to transparency, and the Treasury Department took the decision to have our accounts audited when we didn't actually need to, but we believe the good members of the BNP deserve audited accounts. For instance, this year, every member will receive a profit and loss statement detailing party income and expenditure.

The BNP goes further than any other political party in regards to inspected accounts, indeed, we have accounts audited when it is not required by law, but our good sense tells us that members deserve independently audited accounts.

If this is a problem to the Commission, then it is their problem.

Yours sincerely,

David Hannam

Anonymous said...

"This Roberto Fiore geezer seems to be popular with Nick Griffin. Could it be because hes got pots of money?"

Yes, but it's also because Griffin fancies him and that isn't a joke.

Antifascist said...

Is Hannam really saying that the BNP's income has dropped from over £672,000 (according to last year's accounts) to less than £250,000?

If so, that's a killer!

Anonymous said...

Surely not???

Antifascist said...

Maybe - though I wonder how that ties in with last year's expendidture of £767,000 as well.

This is all very odd.

Anonymous said...

"The BNP goes further than any other political party in regards to inspected accounts"
Oh my God - is this idiot for real???

Anonymous said...

Can't you read?

Hannam refers to 'both our accounting units'.

So he is claiming there are two of them, one of which (the regional) has an income of less than 250,000 quid.

To get the total income of the BNP, that is the total income of both accounting units, we will need to see what income the other accounting unit got.

I hope LUAF will get a copy of these audited accounts and post it with an analysis of their income and spending.

I also hope this task is cdone by someone who can read, write and do simple sums.

Antifascist said...

'I also hope this task is cdone by someone who can read, write and do simple sums.'

LOL That's me told but as you're such a smartarse perhaps we can ask you where the money goes from the Trafalgar Club.

Anonymous said...

So, we're waiting for

2 sets of BNP party accounts

2 sets of GWR accounts

1 completed investigation into fraud regarding Kevin Scott and Civil Liberty

1 investigation into Solidarity

2 arrests and charges in Birmingham for election fraud

1 surely rigged leadership challenge

And, still no news on the Trafalgar Club

Anonymous said...

And Dave Hannam said 'There have been vast improvements in regards to transparency'. Really?

Anonymous said...

Change your world view people. I was in croatia last year and one thing i learnt is it's the friendliest place I've ever experienced. If your not a friendly and happy person there people will avoid you because your not civilized. Please be a little less biased.. your coming across brain washed. Both sides did wrong. But UN were in croatia in 1990's so you can't make up lies this time. There have no zero reports of genicide! I've done my research. What happened to all these Ustasha after the 2nd world war? have you wondered? where are they? did the allies maybe kill every single one of them?? (that's a loaded question btw). What was the ustasha purpose why would they be so evil.. is this a little story made up by some small number of people? Over the last 50 years how many croatians are left in croatia.. 4.5 million Croatian Roman catholics that live around churches. What happened to the others.. who's evil who's sick .. oh what about the Ottoman empire and influx of muslims etc into europe.. where does it stop, at croatia.. who protected europes way of life and religion, croatia! why do we have a war on terror now? Western and north europe islands are just doing what croatians and germans did 50 years ago! protecting europes identity. God why are people so dumb. Wasn't Italy on the german side.. why was the east and Italy on the German side? I'll let you work it out. Hint: Ottoman. If everyone including muslims catholics all people respected they're neighbours way of life no war would have ever been neccessary in the past and today. Think about it all!
p.s. I'm not in any way defending the ustasha or nazi's or the allies etc... everything should be worked out peacefully and logcially.
BTW Good luck on your elections I hope the truth is know and it all works out fair and for the best of everyone.