Germany’s Police Union (GdP) has rejected criticism of describing people involved in weekend riots as young men from a “migrant milieu.” Andreas Roßkopf, who heads the union’s Federal Police section, said officers’ reports confirmed that characterization and criticised politicians for appearing to play down the perpetrators’ backgrounds.
Rioting and looting took place mainly in Frankfurt am Main during the night into Sunday, after thousands of young people had attended peaceful demonstrations on education and social policy. Clashes with police were also reported in Cologne, Hamburg and Berlin. Authorities arrested 54 people over rioting and looting.
Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt initially said that violent left-wing groups and “chaos-makers from the migrant milieu” had hijacked the demonstrations. He later dropped the word “milieu,” referring instead to violent left-wing groups and “migrant chaos-makers.” Hesse Interior Minister Roman Poseck said those involved were predominantly from migrant backgrounds.
Defence Minister Boris Pistorius challenged the wording, asking who it included and whether it distinguished between people who had lived in Germany for generations and held German citizenship. Green and Left Party politicians also criticised the characterization.
Norbert Röttgen, deputy chair of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, said many of those involved were either foreign nationals or Germans of foreign descent, but argued that this did not establish a single shared migrant milieu. He said the violence should nevertheless be met with the full force of the rule of law.
The federal government’s integration commissioner, Natalie Pawlik, also called for a more differentiated discussion. She said possible causes, including a lack of prospects, experiences of exclusion and integration problems, should be considered, adding that the question was why the violence occurred, not where those involved came from.
Sources: Handelsblatt.