Herwig Nachtmann

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Herwig Nachtmann (born August 4, 1940 in Innsbruck ) is an Austrian newspaper publisher , right-wing extremist and former proponent of the National Democratic Party (NDP). In 1995, Nachtmann was sentenced to a fine and a conditional prison term for publishing an article denying the Holocaust .

South Tyrol Terrorism and NDP

In the 1960s, Nachtmann was in contact with the South Tyrol Liberation Committee around Norbert Burger . In one of the so-called "South Tyrol Trials", Nachtmann was convicted in absentia in 1970 in Florence . During this time he was also a proponent of the later banned National Democratic Party (NDP) in Austria. In 1975 he was head of the NDP youth organization “Young National Democrats” for the Tyrol area and in 1981, as a member of the “Comradeship of the former South Tyrolean freedom fighters”, took part in the funeral of Hitler's successor Karl Dönitz . Until 1991, Nachtmann was a mandate holder in the Hermann Niermann Foundation, which was monitored by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution .

Actions against artistic freedom

Nachtmann was chairman of the Graz “Citizens' Initiative against Mockery of Religions, Public Perversity and Waste of Tax Money” and often protested publicly against what he believed to be obscene art. In 1981, in protest against an exhibition by Hermann Nitsch, he emptied a load of dung in front of the Graz cultural center. In 1983, Nachtmann filed a lawsuit to seize Herbert Achternbusch's film " Das Gespenst " under Section 36 of the Media Act. These were the first cases of confiscation in Austria after freedom of art was anchored in the constitution.

Aula publishing house

In the early 1990s, Nachtmann was managing director of the Austrian publishing house Aula and editor-in-chief of the right-wing extremist magazine “ Die Aula ”. As such, in 1994 he was responsible for the publication of the article "Natural laws apply to Nazis and anti-fascists", in which a Holocaust-denying text by Walter Lüftl was described as a "milestone on the way to truth". The so-called " Lüftl Report ", in which the technical feasibility of the Holocaust is disputed, was published in 1992 in the neo-Nazi Journal of Historical Review . In 1995, Nachtmann was sentenced to a fine of 240,000 schillings and 10 months' imprisonment on probation for violating the Nazi ban on re-employment . As a result of the process, the state of Styria and the FPÖ stopped funding the magazine. In 1996, the Austrian Supreme Court rejected an annulment complaint by Nachtmann, but reduced the sentence to 192,000 schillings and 8 months in prison. An appeal against the conviction before the European Commission for Human Rights was dismissed in 1998. After his conviction, Nachtmann gave up the post of editor-in-chief of the “Aula”, and Otto Scrinzi was his successor .

German fraternity

Nachtmann is the old man of the Academic Burschenschaft Brixia Innsbruck , which was classified by the Federal Ministry of the Interior in 1995 as a “cadre forge national and right-wing extremists” and to which he has been a member since his student days. From 2005 to 2008 he was elected editor of the Burschenschaftliche Blätter , the association organ of the German Burschenschaft .

literature

Web links

  • DÖW (PDF; 1.6 MB), documentation archive of the Austrian resistance - functionaries, activists and ideologues of the right-wing extremist scene in Austria

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Die Republik , Österreichisches Nationalinstitut, 1968, p. 14
  2. ↑ a b Printed paper 13/185 of the German Bundestag from January 10, 1995
  3. ^ Herbert Dachs: Handbook of the Austrian political system . Manz, 1992, p. 291
  4. ↑ Gabriele Nandlinger: "Honor, Freedom, Fatherland!" - Fraternities as a refuge for intellectual right-wing extremists . Right-wing extremism dossier, Federal Agency for Civic Education , April 23, 2007
  5. ^ Brigitte Bailer-Galanda : Handbook of Austrian right-wing extremism . Documentation archive of the Austrian Resistance, 1993, p. 121
  6. ↑ Christine Resch: Art as a scandal: the Styrian autumn and the public excitement . Verlag für Gesellschaftskritik, 1994, pp. 74ff
  7. ↑ The freedom of art . Information at Literaturhaus.at
  8. ↑ Die Aula , edition 7–8 / 1994, p. 15
  9. ^ Wording of the declaration of the EKMR (PDF file; 70 kB), documented by the Austrian Institute for Human Rights .
  10. ^ Federal Ministry of the Interior, Group C, Department II / 7: Right-wing extremism in Austria. Annual management report 1994. Vienna 1995, p. 11
personal data
SURNAME Nachtmann, Herwig
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian newspaper publisher and right-wing extremist
DATE OF BIRTH 4th August 1940
PLACE OF BIRTH innsbruck