They should remain under lock and key for over 100 years. Now Böhmermann publishes the Hessian NSU files and implicates the protection of the constitution.
+++ 3.30 p.m.: After the NSU files were leaked by Jan Böhmermann’s political show “ZDF Magazin Royale”, the Hessian Office for the Protection of the Constitution also became aware of the facts, as did the German Press Agency (dpa) writes. The authority “took note of” the broadcast, but did not comment on the content of the published files.
The published files are currently being checked by the Hessian State Office for the Protection of the Constitution, it said.
Update from Saturday, October 29, 11:50 a.m.: “Yes, the files are real,” said state parliamentarian Thorsten Felstehausen when asked Frankfurter Rundschau by IPPEN.MEDIA. “The files were obviously copied verbatim and published with the same content. The redactions were obviously made by the editors,” said the party’s domestic spokesman The left further.
Felstehausen finds it “shameful” that the release is not by the state government, but that “leaks by investigative journalists are needed again”. “Finally the public can get their own picture of how the so-called ‘constitutional protection’ has dealt with indications of right-wing terror over the years.”
First report from Saturday, October 29th: Wiesbaden – Between the years 2000 and 2007, the so-called National Socialist Underground (NSU) killed nine people in Germany. The investigation files of the Hessian protection of the constitution should be in the form of the NSU files actually locked away for 120 years stay. After public pressure, the period was then reduced to 30 years, like that ZDF writes.
In the political show “ZDF magazine Royal“The alleged NSU files from Hesse were published on Friday (October 28). Together with the organization “Ask the State”. Jan Böhmermann and his team one site set up on which the files should be visible.
NSU files: Jan Böhmermann implements what over 130,000 people demanded
On the cover sheet of the documents published by Jan Böhmermann it says that this should be the “final report on the examination of the files in the LfV Hessen in 2012”. The state office for the protection of the constitution in Hesse is in the letterhead of the alleged NSU files.
We believe the public has a right to know exactly what is in those documents that were originally meant to remain classified for more than a century
In a petition more than 130,000 people had recently demanded the release of the NSU files. The long closure times of the files are described in the petition letter as a “deeply questionable and undemocratic instrument”. One However, the state of Hesse refused publication by rejecting the petition.
Protection of the Constitution under criticism: Jan Böhmermann publishes NSU files
The work of protection of the constitution has been criticized several times in the past. Not only in the case of the NSU, but also in connection with the murder of Walter Lübcke. The murderer of the district president from Kassel had not been checked by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution since 2015, according to the website of the published files.
What’s the point of an “early warning system” if it doesn’t notice that neo-Nazis have been shooting people and carrying out bomb attacks undetected for years?
The decision to keep the NSU files under lock and key was made in May 2021 by Hesse’s Interior Minister Peter Beuth (CDU) defended, so that ZDF. A publication could endanger the further work of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, the CDU man said at the time.
Weapons and neo-Nazis: What did the Office for the Protection of the Constitution know?
But what is in the apparently explosive files? The research network Exif – research and analysis examined the 173 pages of the document published by Jan Böhmermann. The summary of the network states: “Around 40% of the content refers to the possession of weapons and explosives by neo-Nazis.”
First and foremost, the report would suggest the mistakes in the way the Office for the Protection of the Constitution works, it said. The authority is said to have had a range of information about heavily armed right-wing extremists in Hesse without actively intervening, according to the first analysis Exif. (Lucas Maier)