refugee accommodation planned
Protests in front of the district council in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
According to the police, 700 people came together in front of the meeting building of the district council of Northwest Mecklenburg on Thursday. photo
© Malte Behnk/Ostsee-Zeitung /dpa
Around 700 people demonstrated against the construction of refugee accommodation on Thursday evening in front of the district council hall in Grevesmühlen. Participants tried to force their way into the hall.
After the tumultuous protests in front of the district council meeting building in Grevesmühlen against the decision to build refugee accommodation, the police initiated four criminal proceedings. The district council was about a new refugee accommodation that is to be built in Upahl near Grevesmühlen in the north-west of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
A police spokeswoman said on Friday that two cases were being investigated for violating the Explosives Act and one each for serious trespassing and violation of the Assembly Act. The number of suspects has not yet been clarified, it said. Among other things, film material is still being evaluated, and witnesses must also be questioned.
The reason for the investigation was a protest meeting with around 700 people, from which participants tried to force their way into the district council hall. About 120 officials had to shield the district council participants and prevented this when the atmosphere was heated. Individuals would have violated the right of assembly with disguises, others are said to have thrown pyrotechnics and smoke pots.
At its special session in the evening, the district council then approved the construction of the Upahl refugee accommodation. Up to 400 people are to be accommodated there in a container building on a district property in an industrial area. Construction is scheduled to begin in March. Critics complained that the refugees were to be housed too far outside of a city and thus many contact points in a small village.
Auschwitz Committee sees right appropriation
The International Auschwitz Committee sees the tumultuous protest against a refugee accommodation during a district council meeting in Grevesmühlen as hijacked by right-wing extremists. “Yesterday’s demonstration in Grevesmühlen shows once again how right-wing extremists are currently trying to incite hatred and attack democracy,” said the committee’s executive vice-president, Christoph Heubner, on Friday. The images reminded him of the attempted storming of the Reichstag building or the attack on the Capitol in Washington.
Referring to the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp on January 27, 1945, he added: “Especially on today’s day of remembrance for the victims of the Holocaust, all democrats should understand that right-wing extremists all over the world motivate each other with their hatred and willingness to use violence and radicalize.”