Man jailed for mob attack on foreigners in Germany 03/03/2008 00:00

German was one of six convicted in the incident.

Guestrow, Germany -- A German man was jailed for 32 months on Monday for his role in a mob attack which targeted foreigners in an eastern German town last summer.

The shaven-headed man was one of six Germans aged 18-24 who were convicted of violent behavior during the incident, which occurred after a town festival in Buetzow on August 24.

During the violence, the assailants chased and punched a Turkish national before ransacking a snack bar owned by Mahmood Saqib, 33, from Pakistan.

Saqib, who has lived in Germany since 2001, escaped injury in the fracas, one of half-a-dozen racially motivated attacks that rocked this country towards the end of August 2007.

"I was in my flat above the premises when they looked up and saw me. 'We'll come up and finish you off,' they yelled. I was terrified," the man from Gujat told DPA.

Between 20 and 40 people, many of them with links to the extreme-right wing, were involved in the attack in Buetzow, 200 kilometers west of Berlin.

Passing sentence in the nearby town of Guestrow, the presiding judge said she believed the Pakistani feared for his life and those of his German wife and five-year-old daughter.

Three of the accused were given suspended prison sentences ranging from 6-12 months and two others escaped with a caution on the condition they perform community service.

The court took into account that five of the accused had consumed large quantities of alcohol before the attack and were not fully accountable for their actions.

Prosecutors had earlier ruled out a right-wing motive, arguing that Germans were among those injured during the rampage.

During the trial, police came under criticism for being slow to respond to calls for assistance and once at the scene failing to take sufficient action to stop the violence.

The incident occurred a week after another high-profile assault on a group of Indian nationals who were chased by a mob of Germans through the streets of Muegeln, also in the east of Germany.

Three men were convicted in that attack, including the alleged leader of the mob, who was sent to jail for eight months.

DPA with Expatica