‘Nazi’ pie maker gets death threats
A confectioner has received murder threats for offering cakes showing banned Nazi propaganda symbols and slogans.The Austrian Mauthausen Committee (MKÖ) a Holocaust awareness group informed police and prosecutors about Manfred Klaschkas controversial business activities earlier this week. The MKÖ was tipped off by horrified customers of the confectioner. A catalogue of previously created products on display at his shop in Maria Enzersdorf, Lower Austria, includes a cake with swastika icing and a pie on which an uniformed arm bursts through to give the Hitler salute.Klaschka has been threatened with murder in several anonymous postings on various internet discussion platforms since the story broke.”People are calling me a Nazi swine on the phone. Im not a fan of (late Third Reich dictator Adolf) Hitler,” he said today (Fri).The confectioner added: “I made these cakes eight years ago. I dont know whats so special about fulfilling extraordinary requests of customers.”Klaschka infuriated anti-Nazi mindset activists, politicians, non-government organisations (NGO) and readers all over the world earlier this week by arguing: “Its impossible for me to trace back who ordered the cakes in question as they were requested by walk-in customers around eight or nine years ago. Furthermore, and this applies to all trades: the customer is always right!”He was also quoted as saying: “If someone orders it, Ill create a pie showing (Libyan leader Muammar al-) Gaddafi.”Spreading Nazi propaganda is a breach of law in Austria. The countrys juridical framework also prohibits the possession and trade of any kind of objects depicting symbols associated with Nazi Germany. The number of violations of this section of the federal law rose by 39.5 per cent from 2009 to 2010 to 741.