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Several German politicians denounced this Sunday an “attack on democracy” after the attempted invasion of the national parliament during the “anti-mask” demonstration, which represented a new stage in the radicalization of the movement.
Images from Saturday night showing hundreds of protesters trying to force barriers and the police cordon to climb the stairs of Berlin’s famous Reichstag building have had a major impact on the country.
The incident was the peak of the protest of the “anti-mask” movement, which It brought together about 40,000 people to protest the restrictions imposed by the covid-19 pandemic, which ended with 300 arrests.
Today, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier denounced the “unbearable attack on the heart of our democracy and the excesses of the extreme right”, as well as the “Reich flags” that protesters displayed to remember the empire that ended in 1919., after the First World War.
“We will not tolerate this,” said Steinmeier, considered the country’s moral benchmark.
The Minister of Justice, Christina Lambrecht, on the other hand, called for “defense against the enemies of democracy”, while the debate on the validity of the authorization for this type of demonstration begins. “The unbearable image of the neo-Nazis at the head of the Reichstag cannot be repeated”, said the minister, while the head of the Interior portfolio, Horst Seehofer, criticized the “unacceptable act against the symbolic center of our liberal democracy.”
This Sunday, the police again mobilized an important device, after some 2,000 people gathered, again, near the Reichstag, at the Victory Column and, later, at the Bradenburg Gates, just a step away from Parliament .
Once again, they were quickly dispersed by security forces, who also proceeded to identify the crowd.
Reichstag and symbolism
The Reichstag, where German deputies meet in plenary, has a strong symbolic charge in Germany. The building and its famous dome were burned in 1933 by the Nazis, an act that was intended to bring what was left of German democracy to its knees between the two world wars.
“The plurality of opinions is a characteristic of the good functioning of a society,” said the conservative interior minister. “But freedom of assembly reaches its limit, when public rules are questioned,” he said.
The Berlin Chamber tried to ban the demonstration, claiming that it was impossible to guarantee respect for safety distances and barrier gestures to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus, given the high number of people who threatened to attend the protest, which was carried out by authorized authorities. of a court.
About 300 people were arrested during the riots with the police, in front of the Reichstag and the Russian embassy, near the center of the city, where protesters also threw bottles and stones at the security forces.
Far-right mobilization
The protesters gathered to criticize the measures imposed by the new coronavirus pandemic, such as the use of a mask, or safety distances, which they consider an affront to individual freedom. Similar protests are taking place in other countries such as Switzerland, France, the UK and Austria.
In Germany, Saturday’s protest came two days after Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government announced new restrictions to speed up infections. A heterogeneous crowd made up of anti-vaccine activists, people who believe in conspiracy theories, citizens concerned about the restrictions, but also, increasingly, according to the authorities, supporters of the extreme right.
“The Nazi symbols and other flags of the Empire do not have space in front of the Chamber of Deputies,” denounced the Vice Chancellor and Minister of Finance, Olaf Scholz. “Seeing the flags of the Empire in front of Parliament is a shame,” Foreign Minister Heiko Maas tweeted.
