Status: 08/22/2022 8:15 p.m
The police speak of an “excess of violence”. During protests against an Eritrean concert in Gießen, visitors, organizers and police officers were injured. Its opponents defend the attacks.
There are sentences that you really don’t want to hear from a police spokesman. “One has to be lucky that nothing more happened here,” is the clear and frightening summary that Jörg Reinemer draws on Monday – two days after it closed in the run-up to an Eritrean concert in the Gießen Hessenhallen violent clashes came.
The record in numbers: 33 injured, including seven police officers. The result of attacks with stones, batons and knives. The concert was eventually banned by the police.
At least 100 attackers
The police spokesman speaks of an “excess of violence”. But what happened? Musicians and speakers from the East African state of Eritrea were to perform in the Hessenhalle on Saturday. The country on the Horn of Africa has been ruled for decades by an authoritarian military junta, which is responsible for Eritrea’s reputation as the “North Korea of Africa”.
Critics of the event had expressed fears that the concert was intended to raise funds for the regime and recruit soldiers for the war in Ethiopia’s Tigray region – in which Eritrean troops are also involved.
In the past there had been protests by exile Eritreans against similar events. Several hundred people gathered in Gießen on Saturday afternoon for a protest. A lawsuit to ban the concert before the administrative court in Gießen had previously failed.
A group of “at least 100 people” finally broke away from the demonstration, broke through the barriers at the Hessenhallen and attacked construction workers, the police said. The forces would have had to use batons and pepper spray against the attackers to get the situation under control.
Afterwards there were repeated clashes outside the hall throughout the evening, explains police spokesman Reinemer. Since the Gießen city festival was taking place at the same time with tens of thousands of visitors, the police felt compelled to stop the concert. The personal details of around 75 attackers were found.
Messe sees responsibility in green city councillors
The organizers of the concert sharply criticized the police on Monday. According to a statement by the Central Council of Eritreans in Germany, concertgoers and organizers were “defencelessly at the mercy” of the violence of the counter-demonstrators. The cancellation of the event meant that those who were attacked found themselves “on the street” instead of being able to seek protection in the hall.
In connection with the clashes, the privately run, non-municipal Messe Gießen criticized the role played by city councilor Klaus-Dieter Grothe (Greens), who has been taking part in protests against events supporting the Eritrean regime for years.
“While the Green local politician Grothe celebrates the appearance of his gang of thugs as a victory for justice and democracy, the trade fair company is appalled by the events on their premises,” said a press release. The trade fair company refers to a Facebook entry by Grothes, in which he is pleased about the cancellation of the concert.
Grothe’s party colleague, Mayor Alexander Wright, condemned the attacks “strongly” on Monday. After clashes at an Eritrean cultural festival in 2019, there were insistence on an increased number of security staff this year. Nevertheless, the intensity of the violence surprised them.
Applicant does not distance itself from violence
The applicant for the counter-demonstration, Tsehainesh Kiros, did not want to distance herself from the attacks on Saturday in an interview with hr. The concert was about “propaganda for the dictatorial president of Eritrea”, in which “advertisement for the war” was to be made. The rioters were mainly young people who had fled the regime.
“The youngsters didn’t accept that we always demonstrate peacefully and go home with nothing,” said Kiros. Therefore, they would have withdrawn from the actual demonstration in order to prevent the regime-friendly concert.
“I wouldn’t have let them get away with what they did. But I don’t mind either,” Kiros said. The young people achieved more in one day than they and their fellow campaigners did in years of protest.