Original Coverage & Source Attribution: www.dw.com
German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt reiterated his statements about the groups responsible for the riots that followed nationwide protests led by young people on October 31.
“There were violent left-wing extremists, and there were troublemakers from migrant communities,” he said on Wednesday during a special debate in parliament.
Opposition parties like the Greens and The Left criticized the minister’s comments.
Irene Mihalic, the parliamentary secretary of the Green Party, even accused Dobrindt of using “racist remarks” to divert attention from the legitimate demands of young protesters.
Some members of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) defended their coalition partner.
“We can only solve the problem if we name it,” said Sebastian Fiedler, the SPD parliamentary group’s spokesperson on domestic policy.
His party colleague Helge Lindh, however, cautioned against “stigmatization.”
Meanwhile, Bernd Baumann, a member of parliament from the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), said Germany is standing on the “brink of an abyss,” accusing the far left of allying itself with those he described as “radical migrants who reject Western civilization.”
Of the more than 8,000 people who took part in the mostly peaceful protests in Frankfurt, authorities estimated there were 1,000 to 1,500 violent troublemakers, “predominantly from a migrant background.”
Lamya Kaddor of the Greens argued that such categorizations must take into consideration the demographic makeup of Frankfurt.
“If more than one in two people in Frankfurt have a migrant background, then it is hardly surprising that many of the suspects also have a migrant background,” she said.
‘Small extremist minority’ turn Germany’s youth protests violent
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