WARSAW (AFP) - Polish police, working with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (
FBI), have blocked a neo-Nazi website hosted by a US server, which published blacklists of Polish gays, feminists and left-wing sympathisers.
"We worked together very well," said Polish police chief Marek Bienkowski on Thursday, who had asked the FBI for help in blocking the website of the Polish wing of the neo-fascist Blood and Honour organisation.
Several of the administrators of the www.redwatch.info site were detained by Polish police.
The website was hosted by a server based in the southwestern US state of Arizona.
Polish police began to investigate the Blood and Honour site after it published its blacklist in February. The list included not only the names of gay, feminist and left-wing activists and sympathisers but also their photos and sometimes their phone numbers and addresses.
On the website, Blood and Honour urged its followers to gather information about "persons engaged in anti-fascist and anti-racist activites, on coloured immigrants, on left-wing activists and sympathisers and on the homosexual and pedophile lobby."
On May 16, a human rights activist, whose name was on the Blood and Honour list, narrowly avoided a knife attack in a Warsaw street. According to the US embassy in Warsaw, the would-be victim is Jewish.
"We believe that attack was linked to the website," police officer Pawel Biedziak told AFP.
On May 27, Poland's Chief Rabbi Michael Schudrich was also attacked in a Warsaw street, although he was not injured. His attacker was arrested last month.
Meanwhile, Paris-based media rights watchdog, Reporters without Borders, has warned the Polish justice ministry that a dozen journalists in Poland, who have left-leaning political affiliations, have been threatened. All the journalists' names were on the Blood and Honour website.
