Expatica news

Politically motivated crimes drop in Germany

13 May 2004

BERLIN – Politically motivated crimes in Germany declined in 2003 for the second year in a row, although Berlin was concerned by rising anti-Semitic offences, Interior Minister Otto Schily said Thursday.

But while the ministry said that overall politically-motivated crimes were down last year, politically-motivated crimes by foreigners surged by more than 100 percent.

By ministry count, there were 20,447 politically-motivated crimes last year, down 6 percent from 2002, continuing the drop-off which had set in after 2001.

“Of special note is that rightist offences have been declining in every category of crime,” Schily said.

At the same time, law enforcement work to solve cases improved last year to 48 percent, up by five percentage points from the year before.

A further area of concern were politically-motivated crimes by foreigners in Germany, an area which saw a 106 percent surge, to 1,743 crimes, last year.

The figure above all reflected the clampdown on the banned Turkish terrorist movement of radical Moslems called the “Caliphate State”, which was deemed responsible for nearly 900 crimes.

 

DPA

Subject: German news