PJ police swooped on alleged members of the Hammer Skin Nation skinhead group today, in an investigation that centres on racial, religious and sexual discrimination, murder, GBH and robbery.
According to reports, 20 skinheads were rounded up following raids in Braga, Lisbon and Albufeira.
The Hammer Skin Nation is an extreme right-wing group that began in Dallas in 1988 and has since “spread throughout the world”.
A statement issued by Lisbon’s PGDL prosecutors office on Tuesday said the arrests followed police and public ministry searches of 35 residences.
Those taken into custody are suspected of encouraging “violent actions” against black people, indians, refugees and those “of a different sexual orientation to themselves”.
Using online social networks, the men are alleged to have incited “hatred, racial discrimination, persecution and physical violence”.
Reports suggest the skinheads “defended the expulsion and prohibited entry of all ethnic minorities into Portugal”.
Between November 2013 and September 2015, the suspects “motivated by discrimination” attacked various individuals and “tried to cause the death of another, as well as subjecting other individuals to violence and damage to property, said the PGDL.
Today’s swoop was carried out in collaboration with the PJ’s anti-terrorism unit which has described Hammer Skin Nation as an international organisation based on nazi ideology.
Tabloid Jornal de Notícias suggests Hammer Skin Nation is the the world’s “most violent” extreme right wing organisation.
