Faeser wants special conference
Scholz: Don’t shrug off attacks on politicians
May 4, 2024, 10:06 p.m
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Within a few days, politicians from several parties became victims of violence. Chancellor Scholz speaks out after the momentous attack against his party comrade Ecke. Federal Interior Minister Faeser wants to gather her colleagues in the federal states.
After the attack on Saxon MEP Matthias Ecke in Dresden, Chancellor Olaf Scholz called for united action against the right. The attack on Ecke was depressing, said Scholz at a democracy congress on the upcoming European elections in Berlin. “Democracy is threatened by something like this, and that’s why shrugging your shoulders and accepting it is never an option,” said Scholz, who, like Ecke, is a member of the SPD. “We have to stand together against this.”
One should also not accept attacks on Green candidates and local politicians. The fact that something like this happens also has something to do with speeches that are given and the mood that is created, said Scholz, with a view to the right-wing populist AfD, for example. Scholz wished Ecke the best recovery – he also spoke out in favor of full clarification.
Ecke was attacked while posting posters. He was seriously injured and treated in hospital. While putting up election posters for the SPD late on Friday evening, four unknown people hit the 41-year-old, the police said. A few minutes before the attack on Ecke, according to the police, a group of four had already attacked a 28-year-old campaign worker for the Green Party who was also posting posters. It also became known on Saturday that an AfD politician in Lower Saxony was first pelted with eggs at his information stand and then beaten by a man. The third mayor of Essen, Rolf Fliß from the Green Party, was the victim of an act of violence on Thursday evening.
Faeser wants a special meeting of the interior ministers
Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier was “horrified” and called the attacks on Ecke and Fliß as well as the harassment and obstruction of Vice President of the Bundestag Katrin Göring-Eckardt from the Greens a week ago in East Brandenburg “unbearable”. “This outbreak of violence is a warning,” he wrote in a statement. He appealed to everyone to conduct the political debate peacefully and with respect and called on supporters of liberal democracy to stand together across party lines against attacks.
After the attack on Ecke in Dresden, Federal Interior Minister Nancy Faeser proposed a special meeting of the federal and state interior ministers. She had already discussed this with the chairman of the Conference of Interior Ministers, Brandenburg’s Interior Minister Michael Stübgen from the CDU, as “Bild am Sonntag” reported. According to information from the “Tagesspiegel”, Faeser suggested a meeting next week.
“The rule of law must and will continue to increase the protection of democratic forces in our country,” the SPD politician told “Bild”. “We need to discuss this quickly at a special conference of interior ministers and put together a joint package of measures for even more police presence on site, more protection and tough action against the enemies of democracy.”