Ioannis Aggos

The absence of 11 of the 18 defendants who are scheduled to testify in connection with the September 2013 murder of Pavlos Fyssas in the ongoing trial against the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party prompted the ire of the bench's president on Friday. "The defendants have an obligation to be here. The court has ways of bringing them in," judge Maria Lepeniotou warned.

Four years into the trial of Golden Dawn as a criminal organisation and for the murder of anti-fascist rapper Pavlos Fyssas, the court began hearing the testimony of those charged in the case.

One of the key witnesses in the ongoing trial against the neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn on Thursday testified to making the call that set off a chain of events culminating in the murder of rapper Pavlos Fyssas in the Piraeus suburb of Keratsini in the early hours of September 18, 2013.

More than four years after the start of a major trial against neo-Nazi Golden Dawn (GD) in April 2015, the court proceedings are entering a new phase on Thursday, with the accused taking the stand.