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This trial will be examined very carefully in Berlin. For weeks, the “lateral thinking” movement mobilized critics of the pandemic policy measures, conspiracy theorists and corona virus deniers for the “Mega Advent Rally” in the Hanseatic city of Bremen. Up to 20,000 participants had been registered with the police for Saturday’s event, far too many for the German judiciary, given the expected hygiene violations.
After the Bremen city public order office initially issued a ban, the Federal Constitutional Court reaffirmed the ban on demonstrations for any “lateral thinking” meeting on Saturday in Bremen in an urgent procedure.
Karlsruhe judges are following the responsible Higher Administrative Court, which previously declared the ban with anticipated violations of pandemic requirements and a possible danger to the public due to an anticipated high number of participants.
By the summer, Karlsruhe had already turned down an urgent request for a permanent “vigil” by Corona deniers and skeptics in the Berlin government district. The decision of the German highest court is now the first to refer to a demonstration of the so-called “lateral thinkers”.
This also raises hopes in Berlin that legal action can be taken against planned demonstrations of this kind. The main focus is on the large demonstration planned for New Year’s Eve in Berlin, in which there will be protests in Strasse des 17. Juni.
Senator of the Interior: We will see it closely.
“We are watching the planned New Year’s rally with great concern because there is a renewed risk of infection here,” a spokesman for Interior Senator Andreas Geisel (SPD) told Tagesspiegel on Sunday. “After the experiences in Berlin and Leipzig, we have to assume that the infection protection rules will be consciously broken again.”
The Senate was still unable to make a definitive decision on the decision in Bremen, as it still did not have the grounds of the Federal Constitutional Court. “But we will read this very carefully.”
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Benedikt Lux, an interior expert for the Greens, told Tagesspiegel about the verdict: “In my opinion, this can be a basis for strictly imposing or even banning the lateral thinker rally on New Year’s Eve in Berlin. I call on the responsible Berlin authorities to take all necessary measures to comply with the protection against infection. “
Criticisms of the ban on spontaneous demonstrations
In the past, several cities have tried to ban the movement’s demonstrations for reasons of protection against infection or to impose strict conditions. The ban on a large-scale demonstration by skeptics of the measures, announced for August 29, attracted a lot of attention.
The order was finally revoked by the Higher Administrative Court one day before the planned large demonstration. At the time, critics accused Berlin’s Interior Senator Andreas Geisel (SPD) that the ban on the demonstrations, which was later re-charged, was also due to political motivations and not just infection protection reasons. .
Minister Geisel: The Office for the Protection of the Constitution is watching closely
Meanwhile, Geisel does not rule out an observation of the “lateral thinking” movement by constitutional protection. “We are clearly seeing extremist and anti-Semitic tendencies. That is why the protection of the Constitution has to be very careful, ”said Geisel of the German press agency. A final assessment of the matter has not yet been made in Berlin.
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According to Geisel, the real challenge in this area is the distinction: who is an extremist, who is an anti-Semite, and who is based on the Basic Law? “There are connections in the movement with far-right parties and people who have made themselves visible. That is very, very clear. ” The protection of the Constitution must clarify if society is not facing a new phenomenon of extremism.
Federal Minister for the Family, Franziska Giffey (SPD), also warned against attacks on democracy from the “side thinker” scene. “We, as a state, must be vigilant when democracy is attacked. Or when our democratic organs are threatened, as they did recently, when rioters entered the Bundestag and tried to prevent parliamentarians from doing their job, “Giffey told the newspapers of the Funke media group. Correction: In several places in the article there was talk of a Constitutional Court ruling. But it is a decision. We fixed the bug.
