A German left-wing extremist has been sentenced to three years in prison in Hungary, while two of his Antifa accomplices, an Italian and a German woman will be summoned to a Budapest court in May for taking part in violent attacks last year. The case has caused a diplomatic spat, with Italy complaining about the conditions of the prison where the Italian woman is being held, and demanding her extradition by Hungary.
Between 9th and 11th February of last year, nine people were injured—four of them seriously—in a series of attacks organised by a German left-wing militant group linked to Antifa. The members of the group surrounded and bludgeoned their victims with telescopic batons and hammers in five separate attacks in five different locations in the Hungarian capital. Their plan was to target participants of the ‘Day of Honour,’ an annual neo-Nazi gathering to commemorate the day when German and Hungarian troops attempted to break out from Buda on the evening of February 11th, 1945. Hungarian authorities banned the event in 2022.
The perpetrators attacked innocent passersby who they decided “looked like” neo-Nazis based on their choice of clothing. The Antifa members—hiding behind masks—followed their victims, surrounded them, and brutally beat them for thirty seconds, in some cases stabbing them with pens, before disappearing from the scene of the crime. CCTV footage of one incident shows a man with a bleeding head after the attack. Another victim’s shinbone was smashed to pieces.
A sixth attack in one of Budapest’s busiest public squares, Batthány tér, was also planned, but by that point, the police were already on the lookout for suspicious-looking groups. The extremists fled the scene, and eventually three of them were caught, trying to escape in a taxi. An international arrest warrant was issued against the remaining fourteen accomplices—German, Italian, Albanian and Syrian nationals—but only one of them, a 23-year-old German man from the town of Jena, was caught in Berlin, trying to escape from the police by jumping out of his hotel window and injuring himself. It remains to be seen whether he will be handed over to the Hungarian authorities.
The main culprit, 30-year-old Johann Guntermann, is still on the run. He is said to be the leader of the so-called Hammerbande (Hammer Gang), a far-left Antifa militant organisation. Another of its leaders, Lina Engel, was found guilty last year by a German court for a string of violent assaults and sentenced to five years and three months in prison. The group is said to have unleashed violence on its victims with hammers, often aiming for their heads, shins, knees, and ankles to cause “massive” and “lasting” injuries.
The three members caught by the Hungarian police appeared before a Budapest court on Monday, January 29th. One of them, a German man, pleaded guilty to the charges, and was sentenced to three years in prison. He is also banned from entering Hungary for five years.
The other two defendants, an Italian and a German woman pleaded not guilty. Their court case will continue on May 24th. The Italian, 39-year-old Ilaria Salis, who entered the courtroom with a smile on her face, has attracted considerable attention after her cellmate spoke to Italian media claiming that they are being treated “like dogs” in prison, saying it was “infested with rats and bedbugs.” Hungarian authorities have rejected the accusation, but the claims led to Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani summoning the Hungarian ambassador..
He said Hungarian authorities had “gone too far” by handcuffing her and locking her feet in chains during Monday’s court hearing. While saying he did not want to interfere in Hungary’s justice system, Tajani stated that “treating a prisoner in that way really seems inappropriate, not in tune with our legal culture.”
