Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
Grevesmühlen: Two suspects known for political crimes
According to investigators, the eight-year-old girl was unharmed in the incident in Grevesmühlen. Photo
© Bernd Wüstneck/dpa
The incident involving a young Ghanaian girl is said to have been triggered by an eleven-year-old boy who tripped her up. Two people involved in the subsequent altercation with the father are already known to the police.
Following the nationwide sensational incident involving a Ghanaian family in According to a spokeswoman, the police in Grevesmühlen are investigating a single-digit number of suspects for dangerous bodily harm and insult.
There is also suspicion of incitement, said the spokeswoman for the Rostock police headquarters to the German Press Agency. Two of the suspects, whose names are now known, are already known to the police in connection with politically motivated crime.
What was the trigger?
According to the investigation, the incident on Friday evening was triggered by an eleven-year-old boy who tripped up a child from the Ghanaian family, an eight-year-old girl riding a scooter. When the father tried to confront a group of young people at the scene, a verbal and sometimes physical argument broke out, according to the police spokeswoman. The father was slightly injured. He was also reported on suspicion of assault. According to earlier police reports, xenophobic comments were made.
In an initial report, the police said that the girl had been kicked in the face and had been injured. This was corrected on Monday based on new findings: The girl did not suffer any physical injuries that would suggest such an act.
According to a report in the “Tagesspiegel”, members of the group of German youths had already attracted attention shortly before the incident at the Grevesmühlen town festival by shouting xenophobic slogans. Security and police ordered them to leave the area. When asked, the police spokeswoman said that they were still investigating whether they were the same people.
Human chain planned for tolerance and solidarity
Grevesmühlen’s mayor Lars Prahler (independent) told the German Press Agency that there are young people in Grevesmühlen “on the fringes that we cannot reach.” However, the town of 10,500 inhabitants has training and jobs, a functioning youth club, school social workers and anti-racism programs in schools. According to him, a human chain of various initiatives in Grevesmühlen is planned for Thursday for tolerance and solidarity.
Prime Minister Manuela Schwesig (SPD) warned against trivializing the incident. “It is good that the girl was physically unharmed,” she explained. “Every mother and every father knows that the shock is deep.” There should be no room for attacks on children and xenophobic insults. The North Church called for human chains with candles around the churches in MV on Thursday.
Meanwhile, the opposition in the Schwerin state parliament, the CDU and AfD, criticized the way politicians handled the incident. The domestic policy spokeswoman for the CDU parliamentary group, Ann Christin von Allwörden, announced that the issue would be put on the agenda of the Interior Committee. She explained that this could be a “very unfortunate” interaction between politics and the media. After the police initially reported that the child had been kicked in the face, a storm of indignation broke out nationwide. The chairman of the AfD parliamentary group, Nikolaus Kramer, explained: “The impression given in recent days that a teenage Nazi mob was marching through Grevesmühlen does not stand up to closer scrutiny.”