Dhe CDU is outraged, the left is pleased. The publication of the so-called NSU files by the journalist Jan Böhmermann in the ZDF Magazin Royale triggered opposing reactions in the Hessian state parliament.
The documents contain test reports from the Hessian Office for the Protection of the Constitution that are around ten years old. The authority had examined its own files with regard to references to the crimes of the National Socialist underground. Because his trail of blood leads to Kassel, the topic continues to attract particular interest in Hesse.
It was expressed, for example, when around 125,000 citizens contacted the petitions committee of the Hessian state parliament last year and requested that the documents be published. The documents are known to the members of the NSU investigative committee. But not only they had access. The members of the Parliamentary Control Commission for the Protection of the Constitution also have access to the files at all times.
Accessible to everyone on the internet
The Petitions Committee forwarded the request to make them available to the general public to Interior Minister Peter Beuth (CDU). He refused because it was classified information that, according to the law, should not be accessible to everyone. This prevents enemies of the constitution from taking advantage of the information and endangering human lives, the minister said in the summer of 2021.
A first look at the extensive material that has now been published indicates that the Office for the Protection of the Constitution had a wealth of individual information on right-wing activities in Hesse, but that it did not put the details together to form an overall picture of how it was after the crimes.
The fact that the files have been accessible to everyone on the Internet since Friday caused joy at the party conference of the left on Saturday. “Finally the public can get their own picture of how the so-called protection of the constitution has dealt with indications of right-wing terror for years,” said the parliamentary group’s domestic spokesman, Torsten Felstehausen. It is shameful for the black-green state government that the files only became public through the use of investigative journalists.
The left found the reports in the secret files and at the time made sure that at least some of them were already discussed in public meetings of the committee. Witnesses have also been confronted with it. The report was not kept secret to protect the country or sources, “but because it paints a devastating picture of the work of the State Office for the Protection of the Constitution,” says Felstehausen. The domestic secret service does not protect the constitution, it endangers it. “He should be abolished.”
The parliamentary director of the CDU parliamentary group spoke of an “illegal disclosure of the NSU files”. Freedom of the press also has its limits. Böhmermann exceeded this limit. Bellino explained that it cannot be ruled out that extremists could draw conclusions about the working methods and informants of the security authorities by linking this information with other documents. This could endanger human lives and make the work of the security authorities more difficult in the long term.
According to Bellino, the files would not provide any new information for the victims’ relatives or others, but they could cause great damage. It had to be clarified how the documents classified as secret got to Böhmermann. It is “interesting that the leftists can confirm just a few hours after publication that the files appear to be complete and have been transcribed with the same content”.