Bavaria’s Minister of the Interior weighs it down
Secret G7 data surfaced online
06/19/2022, 18:01
Police deployment plans from the 2015 G7 summit have surfaced on a left-wing extremist portal. The police are investigating, the data is probably authentic. CSU Interior Minister Herrmann comments on the explosive find: There is no immediate danger for the upcoming summit.
A few days before the start of the G7 summit at Schloss Elmau near Garmisch-Partenkirchen, confidential police documents from the 2015 meeting of the heads of government there were published on the Internet. Among the files are several papers that have been declared classified. These are actually only intended for internal police use and must not be made public.
Several sources in the security circles confirmed that the documents were authentic. The classified material includes, for example, an operational order with detailed listings of police units and their digital radio channels, as well as cell phone numbers for police officers.
But documents on the procedure for arrests, on securing police vehicles and on the de-escalation concept have also appeared on the Internet. Bavaria’s Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann tried to classify the explosive publications: “We are currently assuming that it is not critical for the operation that is now imminent,” said the CSU politician on the sidelines of an event in Erlangen.
“We do some things similar to seven years ago. But the police also do a lot differently than seven years ago. In this respect, no direct conclusions can be drawn from what has been published about the actions of the police in the next few days.” It was initially unclear who put the data online.
Venue is heavily guarded
They were available on Sunday, among other things, on a portal classified by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution as a left-wing extremist effort. According to Herrmann, the police are now investigating. The G7 summit chaired by Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) is scheduled for June 26-28. As at the last G7 summit at Schloss Elmau in 2015, around 18,000 police officers will be on duty.
Opponents of the events have been announcing protests for weeks. However, even a week before the start of the summit, it was not finally clear what exactly the opponents’ protest would look like. For next Saturday, one day before the summit, an alliance of several organizations is planning a large demonstration with 20,000 registered participants in Munich.
In addition, several hundred activists planned a protest camp during the summit time on a meadow in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. The opponents are said to have been banned from several other demonstrations, according to the “Stop G7 Elmau” alliance. The police have already sealed off the conference venue hermetically.
Area closed to tourists
Since Sunday morning, only those who can show accreditation have had access. The area is taboo for tourists. Around the castle there is a 16 kilometer long and sometimes meter high barrier. In order to still be able to protest against the G7 summit within sight of the conference venue, opponents of the meeting want to be taken to Elmau Castle in police buses.
A spokeswoman for the alliance said on Saturday that they had been promised that they would be allowed to protest with a delegation of 50 demonstrators near the hotel. “Anyone who wants to go into the security zone has to give their personal details, be searched and be taken there by police bus.”
That was “an unbelievable curtailment of our freedom of assembly and thus of our fundamental rights,” criticized the spokeswoman. As a result, some demonstrators did not want to attend the meeting. The district office of Garmisch-Partenkirchen initially did not comment on the meeting and the allegations.