German authorities are not taking criticism of the Government’s handling of Covid lightly. On Tuesday, we covered the raiding of the house, office and car of a Weimar judge who earlier this month ruled against the wearing of face masks in schools. Now, reports have emerged that the country’s domestic spy agency is monitoring anti-lockdown activists for suspected sedition. Reuters has the story.
Germany’s domestic spy agency is monitoring individuals who have joined anti-lockdown protests to decide if their rejection of Government curbs amounts to subversion and incitement to violence.
The surveillance includes some members of the “Querdenker” or “Lateral Thinkers” movement, which has been organising increasingly violent protests against coronavirus lockdowns and includes conspiracy theorists and suspected far-right extremists, a spokeswoman for the BfV spy agency said.
The movement started with small demonstrations in the southern city of Stuttgart last year but has grown in scope and reach, drawing to its protests Germans from all walks of life frustrated with lockdowns in place since November.
Authorities fear that far-right extremists and conspiracy theorists who either deny the existence of Covid or downplay its threat to public health are exploiting lockdown frustrations to stir anger against politicians and state institutions five months before a general election…
Domestic spies fear far-right extremists could seek to boost anger against state institutions such as the police after parliament gave temporary powers this month to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Government to enforce lockdowns in areas with high infection rates.
The new powers have drawn fierce criticism from opposition parties, including the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, whose leaders have joined anti-lockdown protests.
The BKA federal police agency has told parliament that the names of lawmakers who voted for the amendments figured in an online document titled, “Death list of German politicians”, while adding that they were in no imminent danger.
A spokeswoman for the BfV said: “Organisers of demonstrations which are mainly led by protagonists of the Querdenker movement have an agenda that goes beyond protesting against the state’s measures against the coronavirus.” The Interior Minister of the eastern state of Thuringia added that attacks made against the police demonstrate the extent of the radicalisation among anti-lockdown protesters.
Worth reading in full.
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Spotted this earlier and was really shocked. I don’t know anything about this querdenker group but investigating them on the grounds of ‘sedition’ is sinister.
querdenker = lateral thinking, in my rough off the cuff german.
This is old news. Basically any organisation in Germany who are suspected of undermining the constitution, and this is more often than not the far right but certainly also includes the far left, are investigated by the federal constitutional court. The AFD are a far right political party with around 10% representation in the German parliament who have struggled, and are struggling, to avoid the Nazi label. It must be said that that the AFD are the only major party with lockdown sceptic policies. The Querdenker is a movement which is opposed to repressive government policies, not just those associated with Covid. Think what you want about the whole process, and I personally believe it is overdone with respect to putting the Nazi label on political opposition and movements, and while the process may not be quite fair it is at least very open. There are huge open political discussions and debates to decide if Movement Y or Party X will be examined by the constitutional court, the court cannot just decide by itself to investigate. And on top of that the court is not a puppet of the government; many government complaints have been rejected by the due legal… Read more »
I´ve read the AfD manifesto. It´s far – right only if you believe BoJo is a Conservative…..
Good analysis. I make no ‘Brexit’ comment intended, pro or anti, but the knowledge in UK of how its neighbours are run is very low. Mainly because the UK media and public attention has always been US-biased.
But will you agree that Germany is currently undergoing internal pressures partly because Mutter is standing down, partly because of realignment to the East and partly because the ‘wind generation’ chickens have come home to roost. Then there is covid and its use to ‘control’ events.
Well it seems neither system works, doesn’t it?
Ultimately the people are the only guarantors of their own freedom.
I think in general it ought to be easier to have a clear written constitution to point at when fighting tyranny, but it has done the Germans little good.
I am not reassured by the fact that there are debates about who can be investigated. If you believe in freedom of speech, which more or less no-one really does any more, if they ever did, then why would you need investigations of this kind. There are plenty of existing laws against obviously criminal behaviour. As soon as you accept you may want to investigate people for “undermining the constitution” it’s open to abuse.
Thank you and Peyrole for your kind words. Indeed neither systems work too well, as has been shown by the quite ridiculous Covid restrictions in both countries. However I maintain that a written document forms a much better basis for protecting the people than the wishy washy “good intensions” of the British “constitution”. Also the debates that go on regarding the instigation of procedures to investigate a particular movement or party surely cannot be regarded as anything else other than healthy democracy? After all the debates are held in what is called “parliament”, and this name is certainly given for a reason.
I would additionally like to say that some of the comments on this thread, yours of course excepted, show a complete immaturity to what is presently going on in the world; intelligent input to any debate looks different from an idiotic an insulting translation of a policeman’s badge.
Anyway, that’s enough talk from me because, as other commentators have said, it’s not all about words. It looks like more serious action may be required.
Germany had a rich history of oppression and tyranny to draw on.
Mind you, our native Fascists are doing a great job of jackbooting a country that once had a tradition of fighting for freedom.
As do the English so say many Welsh Irish, Scots. English soldiers wearing hobnail boots, not jackboots (England could not afford jackboots)
Oh FFS 77 are here again.
fon has been in the officers mess sneaking a brandy or two.
I can roughly translate words on the badge to say “National office for Defence of the constitution, security police” Sounds omminously like STASI (official state security service) of the old east germany. Having visited both sides of the wall, I can say that Germans on either side did not change that much over the 60 years of separation. In some ways they were more friendly and relaxed on the commie side! yes that was a surprise to me as well!!
Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz = Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, which is Federal Germany’s domestic spying agency, intended to find Neo-Nazis and (for a while) Commies etc. The badge is ‘Sicherheitsdienst’ or ‘Security Service’ (the chap may be the premises security rather than an agent for the field) but ‘SD’ was the ‘intelligence’ wing of the SS back in its day, a most vile bunch. Seems a mocking choice of words for a badge.
I’d be incredibly suprised if this was only happening in Germany. I’m sure other governments have declared lockdown sceptics, as well as conspiracy theorists, a threat to national security and are monitoring them one way or another.
George Orwell demonstrated it’s only natural for the state use its machinery. The trouble starts when there is nothing above the state. It has always been a prpblem with the English version of democracy, some suggest a written constitution might solve the crisis, it has not worked in Germany or the US evidentally. Here we labour under the belief that The Commons exercises contol to restrain the excesses of the State. The jury is still out on that.
I half expect that I will be in some ‘educational camp’ before the end of the year. At least I’ll be with some of the best people.
I’m happy to say you are unlikely to be deemed significant enough to bother with. It is both a blessing and a curse of the English syst em, if you ever are deemed significant enough to bother with you will be brought into the establishment.That is how the English system is meant to operate, you see.
A bit of insider knowledge.
It’s good to know I will be left alone.
Please do not believe a word of what Reuters says about Querdenker being rechts. They are absolutely middle of the road people, many who have never in their life been on demos or politically involved.
Querdenken has a huge popularity as they are not affiliating themselves with any leanings. They fight for the personal freedoms and freedom of speech as laid down in the Grundgesetz.
Yes, they are being watched by the Spy Behoerden, as there are a few ex Stasi people in government who cannot let go.
Thanks for the insight Silke. I suppose we could have guessed that would be the case…
‘Germans Acting German’
…bless ’em, they never change.
The Germans were and are always the most zealous and thorough in everything they do.
Whether it’s engineering, obeying and executing orders, denunciating, fascism, socialism or Covidianism.
They only fooled themselves, and us, for a while that they have changed.
I am ready to hand in my passport now. Not my country and people anymore.
More Orwellian dystopia.
The blue shirt has a badge with the word ‘Sicherheitsdienst’ on it, presumably the premises security, not an agent of the BfV, but the word has a sickening and evil resonance with the SD, the ‘intelligence’ wing of the SS.
There was a movement in Germany some years ago called the ‘Anti-Germans’ (who seemed to be ‘Anarchists’ who so hated ‘West Germany’ (but not, it seemed the ‘East’), that some of them produced a song ‘Bomber Harris do it again’. It probably didn’t occur to them that theirs was the sort of fanaticism that led MRAF Harris to do what he got done, and that the best answer was to be more reasoned, but anyway, I do wonder if they had a point buried beneath all that.