Anti-G20 protesters like Islamist terrorists: German minister

Anti-G20 protesters try to breach the security zone and disrupt the G20 summit in Hamburg. File picture: Hannibal Hanschke/Reuters

Anti-G20 protesters try to breach the security zone and disrupt the G20 summit in Hamburg. File picture: Hannibal Hanschke/Reuters

Published Jul 10, 2017

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Berlin/Ingolstadt, Germany - German

Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said on Monday that some

anti-capitalist protesters at the G20 summit in Hamburg at the

weekend were "criminal anarchists" who had acted like neo-Nazis

or Islamist terrorists.

De Maiziere, a member of Merkel's conservatives, said a

triple-digit number of foreigners intent on violence had

travelled to Hamburg from abroad for the protests while hundreds

of other left-wing extremists had been rejected at the borders.

He said it would make sense to have a European database on

left-wing extremists, who had spent up to two years preparing

for the summit and had secretly taken slingshots and other

objects to Hamburg long before the G20 leaders arrived.

Justice Minister Heiko Maas, a member of the Social

Democrats, the junior party in the ruling coalition, said

authorities had lacked relevant data from some European

countries about violent extremists who traveled to Hamburg.

Maas told German broadcaster NDR he backed creation of a

database of left-wing extremists, but said it could take a long

time to set up. In the meantime, countries should at least

exchange data about those convicted of violent acts, he said.

About 20,000 police struggled to contain several hundred

demonstrators who torched cars, looted shops and hurled Molotov

cocktails and stones during the July 7-8 summit. Tens of

thousands more people demonstrated peacefully.

The violence has angered Germans and raised awkward

questions for Chancellor Angela Merkel less than three months

before an election.

"The brutality with which extremely violent anarchists have

proceeded in Hamburg since Thursday is unfathomable and

scandalous," de Maiziere told reporters.

Militants who burned cars or plundered supermarkets were not

activists or G20 opponents but rather "despicable violent

extremists just like neo-Nazis and Islamist terrorists", the

interior minister said.

He added that people who had thrown paving slabs from

rooftops had essentially been "preparing attempted murder".

Martin Schulz, the Social Democrat (SPD) challenger to

Chancellor Angela Merkel in Germany's national election in

September, said the militants had acted like terrorists.

He said the "marauding gangs" could not claim to have any

political legitimacy for their actions, adding: "It had the

characteristics of terrorism."

"Such small-minded skirmishes are the business of people who

took a whole city hostage for their dim-wittedness in an almost

terrorist manner," said Schulz, whose party is trailing Merkel's

conservatives in the opinion polls.

Police said almost 500 officers were injured during the

protests, with 186 people arrested and 225 taken into custody.

Some commentators have criticised Merkel's choice of

Hamburg, a seaport with a strong radical leftist tradition, to

host the meeting, saying her desire to demonstrate her

commitment to freedom of speech had backfired.

Merkel has promised compensation to those who had property

damaged.

De Maiziere said he expected judicial authorities to pass

tough sentences on the militants and added that breaching the

peace could result in prison sentences lasting several years. 

Reuters

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