The disarmament of right-wing extremists is apparently progressing slowly. In 2022, 1,051 suspected right-wing extremists held at least one weapons permit. The left is calling for more speed.
In 2022, 181 suspected right-wing extremists had their weapons permits revoked or returned after pressure from the authorities. This emerges from a response from the federal government to a request from left-wing MPs, which the Germany editorial network reported on Friday and which has already been published by the Bundestag.
Accordingly, at the end of 2022, a total of 1,051 suspected right-wing extremists and around 400 so-called Reich citizens and self-administrators were known to have at least one weapons permit. Final figures for 2023 are not yet available.
A year earlier, according to the government, 1,561 suspected right-wing extremists and around 500 “Reich citizens” and “self-administrators” had at least one weapons license. However, she had also pointed out at the time that the numbers were constantly varying, among other things, due to the “continuous updating of corresponding data sets in the files of the constitutional protection authorities”.
The government writes that since the establishment of the “Reich Citizens” and “Self-Administrators” phenomenon area in November 2016 until December 31, 2022, around 1,125 weapons licenses have been revoked.
Around 23,000 “Reich citizens” in Germany
“Reich citizens” are people who do not recognize the Federal Republic and its democratic structures. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution estimated that around 23,000 people across Germany would be involved in the scene in 2022. In view of the figures, left-wing MP Martina Renner told the RND that “concrete action by the authorities against armed Nazis and Reich citizens” was needed. It is dangerous that the federal government “is not advancing the necessary measures in gun law and is in danger of failing.”
Suspicion of extremism against police officers
Yesterday it became known that disciplinary proceedings or investigations are currently being carried out against around 400 police officers in the federal states on suspicion of right-wing extremist views and the promotion of conspiracy ideologies. This was reported by “Stern” and RTL, citing a query in the 16 interior ministries of the federal states.