Germany may arrest Holocaust-denying bishop for hate crime

Germany is considering issuing an arrest warrant on hate crime charges against a Holocaust-denying bishop, the country's justice minister said Friday. It is a crime to deny the Holocaust in Germany and in several other European Union countries. German Justice Minister Brigitte Zypries, speaking on the sidelines of EU justice ministers' talks in Brussels, said German officials were considering issuing an EU-wide warrant because the ultraconservative clergyman Richard Williamson denied the Holocaust in a Swedish television interview that was recorded in Germany. Williamson lives in Britain. Zypries said that a German investigation into Williamson's remarks was already under way. "Germany could issue a European arrest warrant," she said. A new set of EU guidelines to toughen up national anti-racism and hate crime laws was passed in 2007. Those new guidelines will commit all 27 EU countries to impose criminal sanctions against people or groups that publicly incite violence or hatred against other groups or persons based on race, color, religion, descent or ethnic origin. The guidelines also recommend EU nations impose prison sentences of up to three years for those convicted of denying genocide, such as the mass killing of Jews during World War II and the 1990s massacre in Rwanda. That rule would apply only to genocides that have officially been recognized under statutes of the International Criminal Court. Not all EU countries have implemented the new guidelines yet, EU officials said. During the interview broadcast last month, Williamson denied that 6 million Jews had been killed during the Holocaust, saying no more than 300,000 were murdered. He also denied that gas chambers had been used for the extermination of Jews.