WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The United States on Thursday designated four groups in Germany, Italy and Greece as global terrorists, accusing them of being “violent antifa groups” as President Donald Trump takes aim at left-wing groups.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio in a statement said he had designated German-based Antifa Ost as “Specially Designated Global Terrorists,” along with three other groups in Greece and Italy, in an effort to build on Trump’s “commitment to confront Antifa’s campaign of political violence.”
Rubio said he intends to also designate the groups as “Foreign Terrorist Organizations” from November 20 and warned that Washington would target other groups around the world.
“Groups affiliated with this movement ascribe to revolutionary anarchist or Marxist ideologies, including anti-Americanism, ‘anti-capitalism,’ and anti-Christianity, using these to incite and justify violent assaults domestically and overseas,” Rubio said.
“The United States will continue using all available tools to protect our national security and public safety and will deny funding and resources to terrorists, including targeting other Antifa groups across the globe.”
Trump and his Republican allies have accused antifa followers of fomenting political violence following the September assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and amid protests against federal immigration authorities in cities including Los Angeles, Chicago and Portland, Oregon.
Trump threatened to pursue antifa during his 2017-2021 term in office, and in September called antifa a terrorist organization in an executive order. Some national security law experts said the designation was legally questionable because antifa, short for anti-fascist, has no official leadership or organizational structure.
(Reporting by Daphne Psaledakis, Maiya Keidan and Christian Martinez; editing by Susan Heavey and Leslie Adler)
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