Greater search successes, more recorded violence, including against the police, more sexual crimes, more violations of residence rights, but less fraud and trespassing – this is how the Federal Police’s annual report for 2022 can be summarized. The year in which the war against Ukraine began and the Nordstream 2 gas pipeline was blown up, but also the G-7 summit took place in Elmau, Bavaria. It has clearly shown German security authorities how vulnerable vital infrastructure is, but also representatives of democratic institutions.
According to the federal government, the security situation in Germany has also worsened since the Islamist Hamas attack on Israel. According to Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD), there have been around 450 pro-Palestinian demonstrations since then. This compares to 413 pro-Israel gatherings, said the SPD politician in Berlin on Wednesday.
The tighter border controls are having an effect, says the Federal Police Chief
Faeser announced a tough reaction against anti-Semitic incitement and anti-Israel hatred. “The Middle East conflict must not be fought on German streets,” she said. In a liberal democracy like Germany, freedom of speech, assembly and demonstration are important assets. But if the extermination of Jews is propagated in this country, it is intolerable and requires the full rigor of the constitutional state.
The 54,442 employees of the Federal Police are responsible, among other things, for checking airports and railways, for monitoring the seas, but also for veil searches and controls at German borders and supporting international border protection agencies such as Frontex. In the past year, migration via the Balkan route and Belarus dominated border police work. The number of unauthorized entries alone rose by around 60 percent to almost 92,000 compared to the previous year. The numbers are even higher this year.
Since the introduction of temporary stationary border controls at the borders with Switzerland, the Czech Republic and Austria in mid-October, the federal police have stepped up the fight against illegal entries and smugglers. In the last three weeks alone, more than 9,600 unauthorized entries were detected. Around 3,900 were rejected. The tighter controls would have a clear effect, said Federal Police President Dieter Romann.
The tasks of the 54,442 federal police officers include checks like these at the German-Polish border.
(Photo: Patrick Pleul/DPA)
Since 2016, the Federal Police has been growing faster than any other civilian federal agency in Germany. It has been promised 17,500 additional jobs by 2026. This increase in personnel is now also reflected in the annual balance sheet for combating crime.
The theft of bags and luggage in particular has increased
The federal police registered 702,478 crimes in 2022, 5.2 percent more than in the previous year. According to the annual report, suspicions of property crime in particular have increased, with the numbers rising by more than 65 percent to 56,652 cases. In most cases, bags or luggage were stolen, and the federal police are checking train stations and airports in Germany. A large proportion of the crimes registered in 2022 were due to violations of residence law, an increase of almost 65 percent to 281,506 offenses.
Gun laws were also violated more often, with an increase of 29 percent. Registered sexual offenses increased by more than a third, although this could also be due to changes in reporting behavior. However, according to the balance sheet, the area of fraud fell sharply; with 72,431 cases, the Federal Police only registered half as many incidents as in the previous year.
When presenting the statistics on Wednesday, Romann was satisfied with his agency’s success in the search. Here the hit rate increased again, by 13.1 percent. “Statistically, the federal police identified around 645 people or things every day that were wanted,” the report says. This means that she achieved more than half of all search successes in the EU’s Schengen information system. More than 19,000 outstanding arrest warrants were executed, “the highest number ever achieved.” 132 executed arrest warrants were related to politically motivated crime; more than half involved defendants from the right-wing spectrum.
The federal government is concerned that police officers are increasingly becoming targets. Attacks on officers have increased sharply in the past year, said Federal Police Chief Dieter Romann. Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser strongly condemned this. According to the report, there were 2,807 physical attacks on law enforcement officers last year, twelve percent more than in 2021.