Minister Richard Sulik Testifies Over Extremism Complaint Filed by Far-right

Bratislava/Banska Bystrica, June 9 (TASR) – Economy Minister Richard Sulik (SaS) provided a testimony to National Criminal Agency (NAKA) on Tuesday evening over a criminal complaint of extremism filed against SaS by far-right LSNS party, TASR learnt on the same day.

“The testimony concerned the criminal complaint lodged by LSNS MP Rastislav Schlosar,” SaS spokesperson Ondrej Sprlak confirmed to TASR.

The complaint of extremism challenges the Freedom and Solidarity’s (SaS) election programme titled ‘the 1,144 Solutions’, in which Schlosar sees the number 14, widely considered to be an extremist symbol. Schlosar also avers that the very name of the liberal SaS party and its logo contains two letters “S” – an alleged reference to Nazi paramilitary organisation Schutzstaffel (SS).

“We perceive any attempt to link SaS party with any form of symbolism as an absurd and enormously desperate attempt by LSNS to justify its actions,” stated the spokesman.

LSNS is firing back after its leader Marian Kotleba faces a trial over controversial cheques in the sums of €1,488 handed out as charity. According to the Special Prosecutor’s Office, the number 1488 has significance for extremists, as it’s a combination of the numbers 14 (standing for the Fourteen Words of right-wing terrorist David Lane) and 88 (as ‘H’ is the eighth letter in the alphabet, HH serves as an acronym for the Nazi salute ‘Heil Hitler’).