After renewed riots at an Eritrean festival, politicians are calling for consequences. The state must show strength and, if necessary, ban such events, according to the tenor.
Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser and other politicians strongly condemned the riots at a gathering of people from Eritrea in Stuttgart. “Foreign conflicts must not be fought in our country,” said the SPD politician. The perpetrators of violence must be held responsible.
The Prime Minister of Baden-Württemberg, Winfried Kretschmann, also sharply criticized the acts of violence in his state. “The images of brutal riots with targeted attacks against the police are disturbing and completely unacceptable,” said the Green politician. We will not tolerate “conflicts from other countries being carried out violently in our country.” Such developments will be opposed “with all severity,” said Kretschmann.
Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Thomas Strobl (CDU) also said that the constitutional state would not stand idly by and accept the riots by violent Eritrean groups. It is absolutely unacceptable for intra-African conflicts to be carried out violently on our streets. Such crimes involve a breach of the peace, so the violent perpetrators “must now feel the full severity of criminal law and immigration law,” said Strobl.
Domestic politicians are calling for bans in advance
“It is completely incomprehensible why this event was not stopped and thus the spread of the propaganda of this terrorist state was made possible,” said Marcel Emmerich, chairman of the Green parliamentary group in the Interior Committee of the Bundestag. In advance, one could have tried to obtain a ban in court “to at least send a clear signal,” he added.
The deputy chairwoman of the Union parliamentary group, Andrea Lindholz (CSU), said that it had already been observed at previous similar events by people from Eritrea that the label “festival” was clearly being used to lead disputes between various groups from Eritrea in Germany. “The German state doesn’t have to put up with this,” said Lindholz. A permit can also be refused in advance if the character of a festival has obviously been abused, “if this is foreseeable and if it is not possible to prevent riots through appropriate requirements.”
Dozens injured in Stuttgart
On the sidelines of an Eritrea event, there were violent riots in the Baden-Württemberg state capital on Saturday. The trigger was a meeting of Eritrean associations with around 80 to 90 participants who, according to the police, are close to the dictatorial regime in Africa. Several hundred opponents of the event gathered in the city to protest.
The background to the riots is an internal Eritrean conflict: the protesters accuse the organizers of the event of supporting the regime in Eritrea. More than 200 demonstrators attacked participants in the event and police officers with stones, bottles, metal rods and wooden slats, said police spokesman Timo Brenner.
27 police officers were injured, seven of whom are now unfit for duty, said the police spokesman. There were 21 injuries from the attackers, four of the participants in the event were injured – mostly bruises and abrasions.
By that night, the police had identified the personal details of 228 people and issued expulsions; one person was taken into custody. The suspects are being investigated for, among other things, breach of the peace and bodily harm. According to the police, there were 227 men and one woman, most of whom came from the Stuttgart area and Giessen in Hesse; 63 of the attackers had traveled from Switzerland.
Already in July riots in Giessen
In July there were already riots at an Eritrea festival in Giessen. After violent protests last summer, the city of Giessen wanted to ban the new edition this July – but the courts saw no basis for this. Opponents of the event then engaged in violent clashes with the police in Giessen during the festival, in which more than two dozen emergency services were injured.