Noua Dreaptă

Beliefs

The group's beliefs include militant nationalism and strong Orthodox Christian religious convictions. Noua Dreaptă's website indicates opposition to sexual minorities, Rroma (Gypsies), abortion, communism, globalization, the European Union, NATO, religious groups other than the Eastern Orthodox Church, race-mixing, territorial autonomy for Romania's ethnic Hungarian minority, and immoderate cultural import (including some American culture, manele music, and the celebration of Valentine's Day). They claim to be against both Marxism and capitalism, proposing a concept of "social justice" economics, following the third positionist ideology.

The members of Noua Dreaptă revere the leader of the Iron Guard in the 1930s, Corneliu Zelea Codreanu. Noua Dreaptă members refer to him as "Căpitanul" ("The Captain"), which is what Codreanu's supporters called him during his lifetime.

Goals and actions

The stated ultimate political aim of Noua Dreaptă is to restore Greater Romania, which represented Romania at its greatest geographic expanse before World War II. The group also states it is strongly opposed to the principles of representative democracy, which it sees as an "inadequate" form of government. Some individual members are monarchists.

Noua Dreaptă is registered as a political party since 2015. The number of members is undocumented, but it is estimated from 1000 to 2000.

Some members have also engaged in violence. Incidents have been specifically reported involving physical attacks by Noua Dreaptă members against Mormons and gays.

Among other actions, the organization attempts to attract supporters through publicity campaigns aimed against what it sees as foreign and without any connections with the Romanian traditional heritage (and therefore negative) cultural influences - such as Valentine's Day.

Affiliations

Noua Dreaptă is part of the European National Front, an umbrella group of far-right nationalist organizations, many of which can be characterized as Fascist. The Noua Dreaptă web site includes a column of "links of interest" to numerous extreme nationalist organizations throughout Europe, including the following:

Noua Dreaptă is also reported to have ties to the following political groups:

Extremist reputation

Noua Dreaptă uses imagery associated with legionarism, the ideology of the extreme nationalist and anti-Semitic interwar Iron Guard, which roughly paralleled the Fascist and Nazi movements in Italy and Germany, respectively. The group's symbol, for example — the Celtic cross (usually drawn on a green background) — is reminiscent of the insignia of the Iron Guard.

Noua Dreaptă has aligned itself with organizations elsewhere in Europe with strongly anti-Semitic views, although it has not focused its efforts against Romania's currently small Jewish community. Rather, the group has concentrated its rhetoric and efforts against the ethnic Hungarians, Rroma (Gypsies), sexual minorities and minority religious faiths.

Its anti-democratic and anti-constitutional views and statements made them a permanent target of surveillance by the Directorate for the Defense of the Constitution, a department of the domestic intelligence service.

Political rallies

In May 2006, dozens of Noua Dreaptă members were arrested by police after trying to violently disrupt the GayFest pride parade in Bucharest. Police also used tear gas to disperse counterprotesters led by individuals identified as Noua Dreaptă members.

On 15 March 2008, on the National Day of Hungary, Noua Dreaptă organized an anti-Hungarian rally in Cluj-Napoca — an action which, after group members attacked and beat an ethnic Hungarian celebrator, led UDMR leader Marko Bela to criticize Cluj's mayor Emil Boc for approving it. In addition, two ethnic Hungarian members of the Romanian Parliament demanded the banning of Noua Dreaptă on the grounds that it continues Iron Guard's spirit.

Trivia