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Holocaust denier gets three years

By VERONIKA OLEKSYN Associated Press Writer
Monday, February 20, 2006 8:17 PM MST

VIENNA, Austria (AP) - Right-wing British historian David Irving pleaded guilty Monday to denying the Holocaust and was sentenced to three years in prison, even after conceding he wrongly said there were no Nazi gas chambers at the Auschwitz concentration camp.

Irving, handcuffed and wearing a navy blue suit, arrived in court carrying a copy of one of his most controversial books - “Hitler's War,” which challenges the extent of the Holocaust.

“I made a mistake when I said there were no gas chambers at Auschwitz,” Irving told the court before his sentencing, at which he faced up to 10 years in prison.

He also expressed sorrow “for all the innocent people who died during the Second World War.”

But he insisted he never wrote a book about the Holocaust, which he called “just a fragment of my area of interest.”

“In no way did I deny the killings of millions of people by the Nazis,” testified Irving, who has written nearly 30 books.

Irving's lawyer immediately announced he would appeal the sentence.

“I consider the verdict a little too stringent. I would say it's a bit of a message trial,” Elmar Kresbach said.

Irving appeared shocked as the sentence was read. Moments later, an elderly man who identified himself as a family friend called out, “Stay strong, David! Stay strong!” before he was escorted from the courtroom.

Irving, 67, has been in custody since his November arrest on charges stemming from two speeches he gave in Austria in 1989 in which he was accused of denying the Nazis' extermination of 6 million Jews. He has contended that most of those who died at concentration camps such as Auschwitz succumbed to diseases such as typhus rather than execution.

The court convicted Irving after his guilty plea under the 1992 law, which applies to “whoever denies, grossly plays down, approves or tries to excuse the National Socialist genocide or other National Socialist crimes against humanity in a print publication, in broadcast or other media.”

Austria was Hitler's birthplace and once was run by the Nazis.

Irving's trial came amid new - and fierce - debate over freedom of expression in Europe, where the printing and reprinting of unflattering caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad has triggered deadly protests worldwide.