Status: 07/15/2022 3:15 p.m
After the verdict against Bundeswehr officer Franco A., the Greens and FDP are calling for decisive action against extremists in the public sector. It is “a highly worrying development”.
From the point of view of the FDP and the Greens, the conviction of Bundeswehr officer Franco A. shows that additional measures are necessary against right-wing extremists in the public sector. “Legislators must draw the necessary conclusions from the danger of right-wing terrorism,” said the deputy chairman of the FDP parliamentary group, Konstantin Kuhle. Dangerous right-wing extremists should not find a place in the public service or in the armed forces. This requires common legal standards of the federal and state governments.
Green parliamentary group leader Konstantin von Notz said: “The case of Franco A. has thrown the light on a highly worrying development, namely the deliberate infiltration of security authorities and the Bundeswehr by well-connected extremists.” Numerous questions have remained unanswered despite the legal work-up. The security authorities could not tick off the case with the verdict, but would have to investigate the background and connections further and clarify them.
Change in civil servant status law planned
The interior ministers of the federal and state governments already want to intensify the fight against hate and hate speech in the authorities with a change in the civil service status law. Civil servants should in future be able to be removed from service if they have been sentenced to at least six months in prison for incitement to hatred.
The ministers had agreed on this in June. So far, a prison sentence of one year has been the threshold from which removal from government service is possible.
Verdict: Five and a half years in prison
The Frankfurt Higher Regional Court has sentenced Bundeswehr officer Franco A. to five years and six months in prison, among other things, for preparing a serious crime that endangers the state. The court found the 33-year-old guilty of several charges, including weapons violations. In addition, the court certified that he had ethnic, nationalist, right-wing extremist sentiments.
According to the conviction of the court, A. wanted to influence the situation in Germany according to his right-wing extremist ideas with an act of violence. Possible victims were therefore politicians such as former Foreign Minister Heiko Maas (SPD) and the then Vice President of the Bundestag Claudia Roth (Greens) as well as a human rights activist.
The President of the Central Council of Jews, Josef Schuster, said about the Franco A. case: “The trial revealed the perpetrator’s deeply anti-Semitic and racist view of humanity.” Right-wing extremism poses a great danger to society, democracy and the state.