Austrian Holocaust denier Gerd Honsik was sentenced to five years in jail late Monday, but his lawyer said he would appeal.

Honsik, 67, who was extradited from Spain in 2007, was found guilty by a court in Vienna of denying the Holocaust and the existence of the gas chambers in a number of publications between 1987 and 2003.

At the beginning of the trial a week ago, prosecutor Stefan Apostol had described Honsik as “not just some little Nazi” but “one of the leading revisionists,” a “fabricator” and “dazzler,” whose aim it was to “revitalise Nazism and its ideas.”

Honsik, who already served four years in prison in the 1960s for denying the Holocaust, was sentenced again to one and a half years in 1992 following the publication of his book “Freispruch fuer Hitler?” (Acquittal for Hitler?).

Instead of serving his term, he fled to Spain where lived for the next 15 years, continuing to publish.

The current charges against him relate to his magazine “Halt” (Stop) and two books “Schelm und Scheusal” (Rogue and Monster) and “Der Juden Drittes Reich” (The Jews’ Third Reich) published between 1987 and 2003.

“One hundred and twenty years after (Hitler’s) birth, there are still people who deny Hitler’s crimes. That’s not just sad, it’s dangerous,” prosecutor Apostel said.

Honsik entered a plea of not guilty and, via his lawyer, 87-year-old Herbert Schaller, again insisted that the existence of the gas chambers was “not a fact.”

(Source: AFP)