Two suspected members of Greece’s neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn received life sentences on Tuesday over the fatal stabbing of a Pakistani immigrant last year, a judicial source said.
Dionyssis Liakopoulos, 25, and Christos Steriopoulos, 29, were arrested a few hours after Luqman’s murder when a taxi driver who witnessed the attack reported their motorbike number plate to police.
According to the driver, the pair drove up behind the victim and assaulted him as he was cycling in the Petralona neighbourhood near the Acropolis.
Luqman’s killing, and that of Greek leftist rapper Pavlos Fyssas a few months earlier, prompted Greek authorities to begin a crackdown on Golden Dawn that revealed the group’s violent paramilitary activities, according to investigators.
Six of Golden Dawn’s 18 elected members of parliament are currently behind bars awaiting trial and a total of nine have been indicted on charges of belonging to, or running, a criminal organisation.
