AROUND 50 people were arrested on Saturday as hundreds of neonazis marched through the streets of Gothenburg in Sweden.

Extremists of the Nordic Resistance Movement (NRM) paraded under the slogan “Revolt Against the Criminals,” carrying pictures of the so-called “criminals” they meant — including mixed-race Culture Minister Alice Bah Kuhnke, 93-year-old Holocaust survivor Emerich Roth who is a prominent anti-racism campaigner and Jewish journalist Peter Wolodarski.

Thousands of counter-demonstrators outnumbered the NRM, which organises in Sweden, Finland and Norway and had attracted far-right militants from around Europe to its rally. Police prevented the two sides clashing directly.

The provocation was timed to coincide with Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, although police altered the route to stop the fascists marching past a synagogue.

This prompted march spokesman Par Oberg to threaten not to bother getting police permission for marches in future.
NRM thugs tried to break past police lines, throwing stones, bottles and sticks. Most marchers were in black and many wore helmets and carried shields.

At the counter-protest Gothenburg Teachers Union chairwoman Ulrika Mossberg said she was on the streets “for human rights and against nazism.

“Humanity has learned from World War II that nazism is not an opinion — it is slaughter,” she said.

The counter-demo was mostly peaceful though police chief Max Olsson said “a few individuals” had thrown stones at his officers. “It is a small crowd that expresses its opinions in the wrong way,” he remarked.