5 September 2005

BERLIN - German Interior Minister Otto Schily Monday banned two organizations, one linked to the Palestinian Hamas movement and the other to the Kurdish PKK, charging them with fomenting extremism in Germany.

Police immediately raided 60 premises in eight states, seizing documents and resources of the two organizations, the YATIM child aid organization, linked by the authorities to Hamas, and E. Xani publishing company, linked to the PKK.

"The German government is determined to act against any activities with an extremist or terrorist background," Schily said in a statement released in Berlin.

He would not tolerate such organizations using Germany to organize and regroup outside their home countries, whether they were religious or not, Schily said.

He linked YATIM to the al-Aqsa association, banned in 2002 for fomenting differences between different ethnic groups. The aim of both was to collect money for Hamas for use in the Palestinian territories, he said.

The E.Xani company, which publishes the Turkish language Ozgur Politika, was part of the PKK, now called Kongra Gel, Schily said.

Rights of freedom of the press had, in this case, to take second place to Germany's security interests, the interior minister said.

DPA

Subject: German news