Coercion, assault, incitement to hatred: time and again, asylum seekers in Germany are the target of verbal or physical attacks. The regional focus is striking.
The police registered 519 assaults on refugees and asylum seekers across Germany in the first half of 2024. This is according to an answer from the federal government to a minor question from the Die Linke group in the Bundestag, which is available to the "Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung" (NOZ). Specifically, it concerns crimes such as incitement to hatred, coercion and grievous bodily harm.
According to the response, which is also available to the German Press Agency, 46 people were injured in these incidents, which took place outside of refugee accommodation, including six children. The majority of the attacks - 456 in total - are attributed by the police to the right-wing scene. According to the statistics, there were also 69 attacks on refugee shelters. In the first half of 2023, investigators registered 1,155 attacks on refugees, and 2,450 in the whole of last year.
According to information from NOZ, a regional focus of the attacks is in Saxony and Thuringia, where state elections will be held on 1 September. According to the report, most of the 286 attacks on refugees across Germany in the second quarter of 2024 were in Saxony (41) and Thuringia (35). This is followed by Bavaria (31), Lower Saxony (30) and Brandenburg (29).
"It has long been known that there is a close connection between racist slogans issued by politicians and racist mobilizations and attacks on the streets," said Clara Bünger, a member of the Left Party in the Bundestag, to the Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung newspaper. "When right-wingers call for "remigration" in parliament and even members of the government blame refugees for all kinds of social problems, announce deportations "on a grand scale" or even call asylum seekers invaders, as happened in the UK, racists feel empowered to go on a manhunt and terrorize refugees."