A former leading European neo-Nazi has claimed that he was the middleman in the theft of the Auschwitz sign bearing the three most powerful words from the Holocaust: “Arbeit Macht Frei”.

According to Polish and Swedish investigators, the theft was organised by Anders Hoegstrom — who set up the virulently anti-immigrant National Socialist Front in Sweden in the 1990s. “My role was to get the sign in Poland,” he told the Swedish tabloid Expressen. “I was the middleman and was supposed to take care of the sale.”

Mr Hoegstrom claims that he turned himself in to the Swedish authorities when he suddenly became aware that the sign was to be sold to a collector and the money used to fund a campaign to disrupt the Swedish election campaign this year, if necessary with violence.

“That was not something I wanted to be involved in or carry out in any way,” he said.

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