Pedro Varela Geiss | |
---|---|
Born |
Barcelona, Spain | 9 October 1957
Occupation(s) | Librarian, author, publisher |
Known for | Holocaust denial |
Criminal charges | Convicted for Holocaust denial |
Children | One |
Pedro Varela Geiss (born 9 October 1957) is a Spanish writer, librarian and Holocaust denier. He was the owner of a Neo-Nazi bookstore in Barcelona that is now closed, and he describes himself as a “ National Socialist” inspired by Adolf Hitler. He was also the former President of the disbanded Neo-Nazi group CEDADE to which the Belgian Nazi collaborator Léon Degrelle belonged.
Born in Barcelona, [1] he became the President of CEDADE in 1978, [2] publishing Holocaust denial material. [3]
In 1992, he spent three months in pre-trial detention in Austria for a Nazi speech that he gave, but he was acquitted. After the end of CEDADE, he opened the Libreria Europa bookstore in Barcelona, from which he promoted pro-Nazi speeches, conferences, lectures, and books on anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. [4] In 1998, he was sentenced to five years in prison for justifying genocide because of the Holocaust denial material that he sold at his store. [5]
In 2010, he was sentenced to two years and nine months in prison for the felony of "disseminating genocidal ideals". [6] He was released from prison on 8 March 2012. [7] He went back to run his bookstore. However, in July 2016, his bookstore was closed down for inciting hate speech and racial discrimination. [8]
He has a daughter. He is a mountaineer and an enthusiast of Richard Wagner and his body of work. He is also a Roman Catholic and a vegetarian.