Extremist group brags about forming military arm

The far-right 'Action Group Defiance' whose members are being trained to shoot and master martial arts, has stated that it has enough applicants to form elite units to carry out the work of the police and armed forces, SME daily reports. "Our selected members must be able to replace the work of the Police Corps and the armed forces in the case of serious social crises", reads the statement. It first emerged as a local group concentrated in the Kysuce area (northwest Žilina region) on social networks in 2011. Since then, the group has formed units in Trnava, Trenčin, Bratislava and Prievidza (Trenčin region). It supports the far-right People's Party-Our Slovakia (LS-NS) affiliated with the governor of Banská Bystrica region Marian Kotleba. Security analyst Jaroslav Nad told the daily that the group can be compared to the far-right group Right Sector in Ukraine. He warned that their recent statements indicate a gradual radicalisation of Slovak society. Conversely, analyst Gregorij Mesežnikov of the Public Affairs Institute (IVO) said that this was only a small group with a few dozen members and that it lacks any significant public support. He went on to say that their recent statements are more about self-promotion, although the group might pose a threat to certain minorities.