Names of two prominent Bundestag members on list found by police investigating activities of National Socialist Underground
Police investigating a German neo-Nazi terrorist group have discovered a hitlist of 88 possible targets, including two prominent members of the Bundestag and representatives of Turkish and Islamic groups.
Investigators have been trying to establish whether the list included people the group was actively plotting to kill, or was simply a list of high-profile political opponents.
Two of those apparently targeted are senior politicians from Munich: the Green MP Jerzy Montag and the Christian Social Union MP Hans-Peter Uhl. Both said they were deeply shocked by the revelation.
According to Spiegel Online, investigators discovered the list during inquiries into the activities of the so-called National Socialist Underground (NSU), which is suspected in a string of terror attacks in Cologne and Düsseldorf from 2000-2004. The number 88 is significant, corresponding in the alphabet to HH, or Heil Hitler.
The neo-Nazi cell had gathered the names and addresses in 2005, German police said.
Montag said he was alarmed at the discovery. "This is a terrible feeling for me. The fact that the most significant members of the group have been eliminated doesn't resolve this. If they can come up with something like this, so can others."
Montag told Spiegel Online he was convinced there were other neo-Nazi terror cells in Germany capable of doing something similar. Uhl added: "When I heard I was on the list I was deeply upset."
German authorities have been widely criticised for their failure to stop the group, which killed 10 people, robbed 14 banks and planted two nail bombs over 13 years.
On Tuesday, the Hessen branch of the domestic intelligence service, the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, or BfV, admitted one of its agents had been present in April 2006 when two members of the NSU shot dead a 21-year-old Turk in an internet cafe.
It has now emerged the agent, who was transferred to less sensitive work following an investigation, openly held rightwing views and was known in the village where he grew up as "Little Adolf".
When police raided his flat following the murder, they found a cache of guns, for which he had a legitimate licence, and extracts from Mein Kampf, according to Der Spiegel. There were unconfirmed reports the man was present at three or more other neo-Nazi murder scenes.
Hajo Funke, an expert in rightwing extremism, told ARD television: "It can't be ruled out that this BfV employee took part in the murder, and that is a scandal." He called the case "a Watergate-scale" crisis for German secret intelligence.
The interior minister, Hans-Peter Friedrich, has called for a national register listing all neo-Nazis. The database should hold "information about potentially violent rightwing extremists and rightwing politically motivated acts of violence", he told the Süddeutsche Zeitung. It should be accessible to all 16 regional branches of the domestic intelligence service, as well as the national umbrella organisation, plus police authorities, he said.
Following the discovery of the terror cell's base in the quiet town of Zwickau, near the Czech border, the German government is under pressure to explain how the group managed to murder undetected for so long. The two men and one woman believed to be founder members of the NSU were known to police in their home town of Jena, east Germany, after a bomb-making factory was discovered in the garage rented by the woman, Beate Zschäpe, in 1998.
The local branch of the Thuringian secret service allegedly had 24 lever-arch files on the trio and yet only uncovered the cell years after they carried out at least 10 murders – and after the men were found dead, apparently following a joint suicide pact, and Zschäpe turned herself in to police.
Zschäpe has remained silent since turning herself in last week, but some local media reports suggested she had told police she was ready to be interviewed about her involvement.
On Tuesday evening, Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union (CDU) voted at its party conference in Leipzig for a ban on the NPD (German Democratic party), a legal far-right group which has seats in a number of local parliaments in the former East Germany. The opposition Social Democrats have also called for the NPD to be outlawed.
Such calls have been criticised by politicians in Merkel's own coalition. Uhl, an expert in interior security, said: "There is no better sign of democracy than for the electorate to vote against the NPD at elections. That's the most noble way."
Uhl said it would be better for Germany's strict data protection laws to be changed to allow detectives to analyse communications. "The whole country is wondering how big the neo-Nazi quagmire is in Germany. Without using internet and telephone data collected from the Zwickau cell that is going to be difficult to establish," he told the Neue Osnabrücke Zeitung.
Earlier this week Merkel described the case as a "disgrace" for Germany.
The Guardian
Showing posts with label 88. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 88. Show all posts
November 16, 2011
August 15, 2011
From the EDL 's secret Neo-Nazi 'Order 88' group
Click on image for full-size
Source: Hate on Display
Labels:
88,
EDL,
English Defence League,
heil hitler,
neo-Nazis
July 05, 2011
Hiding in plain sight: Germany's Neo-Nazis ditch skinhead look
Far-right groups are hoping to win votes by blending in with mainstream society – but they are still clinging to the hate crimes.
The summer fete was well under way in the normally sleepy village of Lübtheen in the Mecklenburg region of eastern Germany. Locals tending stalls outside low red brick houses offered home-baked bread and smoke-cured sausage. They hardly noticed the group of well-groomed young men in orangeT-shirts mingling with the crowd and distributing balloons and leaflets.
"The shirts they were wearing were exactly the same colour as those usually worn by Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives at campaign rallies," Ute Lindenau, Lübtheen's mayor, told The Independent. "Nobody had the slightest idea that the men were all neo-Nazis until after they had left and people had time to study their vile propaganda."
The new and almost covert style of canvassing was being practised by Germany's neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD), which is fighting to retain parliamentary seats in key elections in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern this autumn. The party first won seats there in 2006 after mounting a virulent campaign against foreigners. It also has seats in the east German state of Saxony
For Mrs Lindenau, the tactic was not much of a surprise. As a committed anti-Nazi and the mayor of a town known as a far-right stronghold of the east, she has watched the NPD gradually shed its skinhead image in an attempt to appeal to more voters. "These days the neo-Nazis are almost invariably polite and they make an effort to look respectable. They seem to have realised that the skinhead look is a vote loser," she said.
Mrs Lindenau's observations have now been borne out by Germany's Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BVS), the equivalent of Britain's MI5. In a report published last week, the domestic intelligence agency concluded that the country's far right had all but completely shed the aggressive skinhead image it was renowned for in the 1990s. "Members of the far right scene prefer to wear clothing or brands that orient themselves more towards general trends in youth fashion," the report noted. "The more noticeable skinhead culture is becoming increasingly less interesting for far right extremist youths."
But the less aggressive image adopted by the German far right has not resulted in a corresponding drop in violence. On the contrary, the BVS found that the number of neo-Nazis prepared to use extreme violence to convey their political message had increased dramatically, from 5,000 in 2009 to 5,600 last year. The report put the total number of far right extremists at 25,000 and noted that the number of far right crimes in the former communist east had risen by an alarming 40 per cent.
The kind of violence meted out by Germany's growing "autonomous nationalist" groups was graphically illustrated in March this year at the trial of members of a banned neo-Nazi group called Sturm 34. In a style reminiscent of the campaign mounted by Hitler's Nazis to make German towns and villages "Jew-free", Sturm 34 set about trying to make the east German town of Mittweida "insect-free and brown".
"Brown" is a German byword for Nazi. By "insect-free", the group signalled that it was out to rid the town of anyone who held a different opinion to its own. The court heard how the gang patrolled Mittweida and set about "insects" – mostly punk rockers and vagrants – with baseball bats and boxing gloves filled with sand to double the effect of face punches.
Sturm 34 persecuted the town's inhabitants for months before police finally intervened. In one particularly brutal incident the gang appears to have practised a favourite form of neo-Nazi assault called "kerb biting" in which the victim's lower jaw is smashed against a kerbstone with a kick from a steel-capped boot.
Experts on the far right say that in public the NPD's political core goes out of its way to distance itself from such behaviour in public. Many of its members have exchanged skinhead haircuts and boots for an almost preppy look.
Michael Weiss, the author of a new study on neo-Nazi dress codes entitled Hide and Seek, says the increasingly ordinary appearance of far-right extremists means they can often blend in at left-wing demonstrations or in sports stadiums. "These people no longer stand out," he said.
To recognise each other, neo-Nazis now resort increasingly to an array of about 150 secret codes, according to Mr Weiss. These include the number 88 on T-shirts or other garments. The eight represents the eighth letter of the alphabet, so 88 corresponds to HH, for Heil Hitler, a phrase banned in Germany along with the swastika.
Neo-Nazis have also started to wear the black and white Palestinian Kaffiyeh scarf – a garment once the preserve of the far left at demonstrations – in an attempt to signal that they are against Israel. "Their style incorporates elements from rock and pop culture. Neo-Nazis now have piercings," Mr Weiss said.
In Mecklenburg, where the NPD's popularity may be just enough to enable it to stay in parliament after this autumn's state election, the party's attempts to garner support have not been confined to a new dress code. The Social Democrat-run state government recently became so concerned about the party's attempts to infiltrate schools and youth groups that it insisted teachers sign a declaration pledging their commitment to democracy.
However some of the far-right party's politicians have not managed to hide behind the new guise of respectability. Sven Kruger, a building contractor who is also an NPD politician, has been exposed for using a sign to advertise his company which shows a sledgehammer smashing what looks like a Star of David. His premises were searched last year and prosecutors discovered photographs of German Jewish community leaders which were suspected of having been used as targets for pistol shooting practice.
Finding new support
* Germany banned Hitler's National Socialist Party in 1945, but the neo-Nazi NPD was allowed to form in West Germany in 1964 and made some short-lived political gains during that decade, although it has never entered a national government.
The party found new support in east Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and has since won seats in eastern state parliaments.
The government tried to ban the NPD in 2001, but the constitutional court overruled it. The NPD merged with another far-right party, the German People's Union (DVU) last year. It is estimated to have 6,600 members and 25,000 supporters, many of whom belong to other neo-Nazi groups.
Independent
The summer fete was well under way in the normally sleepy village of Lübtheen in the Mecklenburg region of eastern Germany. Locals tending stalls outside low red brick houses offered home-baked bread and smoke-cured sausage. They hardly noticed the group of well-groomed young men in orangeT-shirts mingling with the crowd and distributing balloons and leaflets.
"The shirts they were wearing were exactly the same colour as those usually worn by Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives at campaign rallies," Ute Lindenau, Lübtheen's mayor, told The Independent. "Nobody had the slightest idea that the men were all neo-Nazis until after they had left and people had time to study their vile propaganda."
The new and almost covert style of canvassing was being practised by Germany's neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD), which is fighting to retain parliamentary seats in key elections in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern this autumn. The party first won seats there in 2006 after mounting a virulent campaign against foreigners. It also has seats in the east German state of Saxony
For Mrs Lindenau, the tactic was not much of a surprise. As a committed anti-Nazi and the mayor of a town known as a far-right stronghold of the east, she has watched the NPD gradually shed its skinhead image in an attempt to appeal to more voters. "These days the neo-Nazis are almost invariably polite and they make an effort to look respectable. They seem to have realised that the skinhead look is a vote loser," she said.
Mrs Lindenau's observations have now been borne out by Germany's Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BVS), the equivalent of Britain's MI5. In a report published last week, the domestic intelligence agency concluded that the country's far right had all but completely shed the aggressive skinhead image it was renowned for in the 1990s. "Members of the far right scene prefer to wear clothing or brands that orient themselves more towards general trends in youth fashion," the report noted. "The more noticeable skinhead culture is becoming increasingly less interesting for far right extremist youths."
But the less aggressive image adopted by the German far right has not resulted in a corresponding drop in violence. On the contrary, the BVS found that the number of neo-Nazis prepared to use extreme violence to convey their political message had increased dramatically, from 5,000 in 2009 to 5,600 last year. The report put the total number of far right extremists at 25,000 and noted that the number of far right crimes in the former communist east had risen by an alarming 40 per cent.
The kind of violence meted out by Germany's growing "autonomous nationalist" groups was graphically illustrated in March this year at the trial of members of a banned neo-Nazi group called Sturm 34. In a style reminiscent of the campaign mounted by Hitler's Nazis to make German towns and villages "Jew-free", Sturm 34 set about trying to make the east German town of Mittweida "insect-free and brown".
"Brown" is a German byword for Nazi. By "insect-free", the group signalled that it was out to rid the town of anyone who held a different opinion to its own. The court heard how the gang patrolled Mittweida and set about "insects" – mostly punk rockers and vagrants – with baseball bats and boxing gloves filled with sand to double the effect of face punches.
Sturm 34 persecuted the town's inhabitants for months before police finally intervened. In one particularly brutal incident the gang appears to have practised a favourite form of neo-Nazi assault called "kerb biting" in which the victim's lower jaw is smashed against a kerbstone with a kick from a steel-capped boot.
Experts on the far right say that in public the NPD's political core goes out of its way to distance itself from such behaviour in public. Many of its members have exchanged skinhead haircuts and boots for an almost preppy look.
Michael Weiss, the author of a new study on neo-Nazi dress codes entitled Hide and Seek, says the increasingly ordinary appearance of far-right extremists means they can often blend in at left-wing demonstrations or in sports stadiums. "These people no longer stand out," he said.
To recognise each other, neo-Nazis now resort increasingly to an array of about 150 secret codes, according to Mr Weiss. These include the number 88 on T-shirts or other garments. The eight represents the eighth letter of the alphabet, so 88 corresponds to HH, for Heil Hitler, a phrase banned in Germany along with the swastika.
Neo-Nazis have also started to wear the black and white Palestinian Kaffiyeh scarf – a garment once the preserve of the far left at demonstrations – in an attempt to signal that they are against Israel. "Their style incorporates elements from rock and pop culture. Neo-Nazis now have piercings," Mr Weiss said.
In Mecklenburg, where the NPD's popularity may be just enough to enable it to stay in parliament after this autumn's state election, the party's attempts to garner support have not been confined to a new dress code. The Social Democrat-run state government recently became so concerned about the party's attempts to infiltrate schools and youth groups that it insisted teachers sign a declaration pledging their commitment to democracy.
However some of the far-right party's politicians have not managed to hide behind the new guise of respectability. Sven Kruger, a building contractor who is also an NPD politician, has been exposed for using a sign to advertise his company which shows a sledgehammer smashing what looks like a Star of David. His premises were searched last year and prosecutors discovered photographs of German Jewish community leaders which were suspected of having been used as targets for pistol shooting practice.
Finding new support
* Germany banned Hitler's National Socialist Party in 1945, but the neo-Nazi NPD was allowed to form in West Germany in 1964 and made some short-lived political gains during that decade, although it has never entered a national government.
The party found new support in east Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and has since won seats in eastern state parliaments.
The government tried to ban the NPD in 2001, but the constitutional court overruled it. The NPD merged with another far-right party, the German People's Union (DVU) last year. It is estimated to have 6,600 members and 25,000 supporters, many of whom belong to other neo-Nazi groups.
Independent
December 04, 2008
Neo-Nazi 'waged racist campaign against mixed-race couple'
A neo-Nazi from Grimsby waged a racist campaign against a couple because they were mixed-race, a court has heard.
Nathan Worrell, 35, is accused of hoarding bomb-making manuals and materials and waging a racist campaign against a mixed-race couple who lived nearby. Books and manuals containing "recipes" to make bombs and detonators using household items such as weed killer, lighter fluid and sugar were found by police at the defendant's flat, a jury at Grimsby Crown Court heard.
Also found were numerous boxes of matches, 171 match heads, two tubs of sodium chlorate weed killer and three bottles of lighter fluid. Fireworks, some of which had been tampered with, were also found in the flat, the jury was told. The prosecution alleges they had been tampered with in order to get at the gunpowder inside.
David Farrell QC, prosecuting, told the jury these items featured in the manuals and books found in the flat. The jury was also shown a video by the extreme far-right group Combat 18 showing how to prepare and make a bomb from household items, which was found in Worrell's flat.
A significant amount of racist and far-right propaganda was also found in the ground-floor flat by police, as well as membership cards of groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, the November Ninth Society and the British People's Party.
Worrell admitted to police in interview that he was a white nationalist, Mr Farrell told the court. He also said Worrell signed his texts off as "88" - the sign for Adolf Hitler.
Earlier the court heard how racist stickers had been left on the gate and a nearby lamppost of the home of a mixed-race couple. The prosecution alleges that jobless Worrell was behind the "stickering" campaign, which lasted for a year. One sticker read: "Only inferior white women date outside their race. Be proud of your heritage. Don't be a race-mixing slut" while another from the Combat 18 group said: "It's our country. Let's win it back. Repatriation now."
Worrell is charged with possessing items for terrorism including manuals and equipment for making explosives and for racially aggravated public offences against a mixed-race couple, who cannot be named for legal reasons. He denies both charges. The trial continues.
Beverley Guardian
Nathan Worrell, 35, is accused of hoarding bomb-making manuals and materials and waging a racist campaign against a mixed-race couple who lived nearby. Books and manuals containing "recipes" to make bombs and detonators using household items such as weed killer, lighter fluid and sugar were found by police at the defendant's flat, a jury at Grimsby Crown Court heard.
Also found were numerous boxes of matches, 171 match heads, two tubs of sodium chlorate weed killer and three bottles of lighter fluid. Fireworks, some of which had been tampered with, were also found in the flat, the jury was told. The prosecution alleges they had been tampered with in order to get at the gunpowder inside.
David Farrell QC, prosecuting, told the jury these items featured in the manuals and books found in the flat. The jury was also shown a video by the extreme far-right group Combat 18 showing how to prepare and make a bomb from household items, which was found in Worrell's flat.
A significant amount of racist and far-right propaganda was also found in the ground-floor flat by police, as well as membership cards of groups such as the Ku Klux Klan, the November Ninth Society and the British People's Party.
Worrell admitted to police in interview that he was a white nationalist, Mr Farrell told the court. He also said Worrell signed his texts off as "88" - the sign for Adolf Hitler.
Earlier the court heard how racist stickers had been left on the gate and a nearby lamppost of the home of a mixed-race couple. The prosecution alleges that jobless Worrell was behind the "stickering" campaign, which lasted for a year. One sticker read: "Only inferior white women date outside their race. Be proud of your heritage. Don't be a race-mixing slut" while another from the Combat 18 group said: "It's our country. Let's win it back. Repatriation now."
Worrell is charged with possessing items for terrorism including manuals and equipment for making explosives and for racially aggravated public offences against a mixed-race couple, who cannot be named for legal reasons. He denies both charges. The trial continues.
Beverley Guardian
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