New Year’s Eve riots in Berlin, Germany: The first names of the perpetrators remain secret

The red-green-red senate has reiterated its claim that two thirds of the suspects arrested on New Year’s Eve were German. The state government does not want to disclose the first names, which could give information about a possible migration background. The AfD parliamentary group had also asked for this information in a parliamentary question.

The answer of the Berlin state government, which is exclusively available to the newspaper JUNGE FREIHEIT, states that “71 criminal charges were filed after attacks on the Berlin police and the Berlin fire brigade”. In 42 cases, according to the Senate, at least one suspect is being investigated. All of them are at large, no arrest warrant has been issued in any of the cases.

According to the report, 28 people with German citizenship and 14 foreigners were among those arrested. The AfD’s further question about the first names of these persons was rejected by the Senate: “First names of suspects cannot be transmitted due to data protection reasons, especially the personal rights of the persons concerned”.

The parliamentary director of the AfD parliamentary group, Ronald Gläser, who asked the question, is not satisfied with this. He told the newspaper JUNGE FREIHEIT: “What kind of data protection reasons are these supposed to be? First names are not complete names. No one can infer a specific person.” He announced that he would sue for the release of the information. He said the Senate knew that his group would be proved right with the lawsuit. “He is just trying to stall for time before the election,” Gläser suspects. The election for the House of Representatives will be held on February 13.

Gläser had already asked the parliamentary question on January 3. Two days later, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) publicly announced that it would ask for the first names in the Interior Committee of the Berlin House of Representatives. Already there, the Senate did not answer. As expected, it retreated to formal criteria. Since then, the CDU has not investigated the matter any further. The issue had disappeared from the media.

According to the Senate’s answer to the AfD’s question, 49 police officers and 15 firefighters were injured on New Year’s Eve. The rioters also damaged a total of 36 vehicles; 26 of the police and ten of the fire brigade.

https://web.archive.org/web/20230124070327/https://jungefreiheit.de/politik/deutschland/2023/berlin-silvester-vornamen-afd/

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