Horror after assault on SPD politician in Dresden | EUROtoday

There are repeated assaults on politicians. But the brutality of the assault on SPD politician Ecke in Dresden is inflicting horror throughout the nation. We shouldn't settle for this, mentioned Chancellor Scholz.

SPD MEP Matthias Ecke was attacked and severely injured whereas sticking up posters in Dresden. This act of violence triggered horror and outrage throughout the nation. Politicians from many events condemned the assault. Chancellor Olaf Scholz spoke at a democracy congress in Berlin and known as the act miserable. “Democracy is threatened by something like this, and that’s why shrugging it off is never an option,” mentioned Scholz. “We have to stand together against this.”

One also needs to not settle for assaults on Green candidates and native politicians. The indisputable fact that one thing like this occurs additionally has one thing to do with speeches which are given and the temper that’s created, mentioned Scholz.

Attack in the dead of night

The 41-year-old Ecke was attacked by 4 masked folks whereas posting posters on Friday night. He was severely injured and handled in hospital. According to police, the attackers have been younger males between 17 and 20 years previous. A witness assigned the attackers to the right-wing spectrum, the police mentioned.

According to the SPD Saxony, there have been additionally makes an attempt at intimidation, destruction of posters and insults amongst different occasion poster groups.

It wasn't the one incident that night: two Green Party marketing campaign groups have been additionally attacked. The police assume that it was the identical perpetrators.

The incidents in Dresden are a part of a sequence of assaults on occasion members within the run-up to the native and European elections on June ninth. It was solely on Thursday night that the Green Party member of the Bundestag Kai Gehring and his occasion colleague Rolf Fliß mentioned they have been attacked after a celebration occasion in Essen. Last weekend, members of the Green Party in Chemnitz and Zwickau have been attacked whereas placing up election posters. According to police, a member of the AfD state parliament was overwhelmed at an data stand in Nordhorn, Lower Saxony, on Saturday morning.

“Attack on democracy and therefore on all of us”

Politicians from the SPD, Greens, FDP, Union and AfD condemned the violence. Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD) introduced a troublesome response. If a politically motivated assault on Ecke is confirmed a number of weeks earlier than the European elections, then “this serious act of violence is also a serious attack on democracy,” she defined. Faeser spoke of a “new dimension of anti-democratic violence.” The SPD leaders Saskia Esken and Lars Klingbeil spoke of a deceitful assault and condemned it “in the strongest possible terms”. “The perpetrators want to intimidate us as representatives of a democratic society. But they will never succeed,” it mentioned in a press release.

Saxony's Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer (CDU) known as the assault on X “shocking”. “We know attacks and intimidation from political competitors from the darkest eras of our history.” CDU General Secretary Carsten Linnemann defined on X: “We democrats will not allow ourselves to be intimidated by the enemies of democracy.”

FDP chief and Finance Minister Christian Lindner known as the act “shocking”. The FDP's prime candidate for the European elections, Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann, mentioned on

“Violence in the election campaign is an attack on democracy and therefore on all of us,” wrote Green Party chief Ricarda Lang on to induce them to retreat”. They have been “attacks on our democracy, on our republic,” he defined.

AfD chairman Tino Chrupalla additionally condemned the brutal assault: “We deeply condemn physical attacks against politicians from all parties. Election campaigns must be conducted in a hard and constructive manner, but without violence,” wrote the federal occasion and parliamentary group chief, who himself comes from Saxony, on X. He needs Ecke “a lot of strength and a speedy recovery.” SPD politicians had beforehand held the AfD partly accountable for the local weather through which such acts of violence happen.

Increased assaults on politicians

Violent crimes towards occasion representatives have lately elevated. According to a response from the federal authorities to an AfD request, Green Party politicians have been significantly affected: According to preliminary figures, 1,219 circumstances have been recorded in 2023. This is a major improve; in 2022 there have been nonetheless 575 offenses.

AfD politicians have been additionally regularly bodily attacked. The preliminary statistics document 478 circumstances. The SPD was hit third most frequently with 420 crimes.

According to authorities figures, 10,537 crimes have been reported for all events collectively from 2019 to 2023.