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WORLD NEWS Wednesday 19 June 2019

German govt calls official’s killing ‘attack on all of us’

By FRANK JORDANS cratic Union party, told
Associated Press Deutschlandfunk radio on
BERLIN (AP) — The killing of Tuesday he saw a “direct
a politician who supported line” between Luebcke’s
refugees, allegedly carried slaying and the anti-mi-
out by a man with a record grant, anti-government po-
of violent hate crimes, is an sitions expressed by some
“alarm signal” that high- people in Alternative for
lights the threat posed by Germany.
far-right extremism, Ger- Leaders of the party, known
many’s top security official as AfD, condemned the
said Tuesday. killing and called for a thor-
The motive of the 45-year- ough investigation. Alterna-
old German man accused tive for Germany declined
in the slaying has yet to be to confirm reports Stephan
conclusively confirmed, E. made a donation to the
Interior Minister Horst See- party in the past, saying it
hofer said. However, fed- was bound by data pro-
eral prosecutors were put tection and privacy laws.
in charge of the case be- The slaying evoked mem-
cause “there is sufficient ories in Germany of the
evidence for a far-right National Socialist Under-
background to the crime,” ground , a neo-Nazi group
he said. found responsible for killing
“A far-right attack on a 10 people between 2000
leading representative of In this June 13, 2019 file photo a picture of Walter Luebcke stands behind his coffin during the and 2007. Most of the NSU
the state is an alarm signal, funeral service in Kassel, Germany. victims were immigrants.
and it’s directed at all of Associated Press Authorities did not connect
us,” Seehofer said during a The suspect detained in Lu- “Just as we had the cat- a group. The suspect ac- the killings to the far-right
news conference in Berlin. ebcke’s death was known egory of ‘sleepers’ with tively spread far-right views activity until 2011, when
Walter Luebcke, 65, a long- to police as a far-right ex- Islamists, we have to con- on social media, according two of the group’s three
time member of Chancel- tremist with convictions for sider such a scenario a pos- to German news outlets. core members died after a
lor Angela Merkel’s center- violent crimes dating from sibility in the area of right- Luebcke was a target of botched bank robbery.
right party, was found June the late 1980s to 2009, Ger- wing extremism,” said Hal- online hate comments be- Eva Hoegl, a lawmaker
2 outside his home suffering man media reported. They denwang. fore and after his killing, with the center-left Social
from a short-range pistol include a 1993 pipe bomb Germany’s top-selling Bild behavior Seehofer con- Democrats, called on au-
shot to the head. Luebcke attack on a refugee shelter newspaper published a demned but refrained from thorities to release long-
led a regional government in Germany’s Hesse state. photo of the suspect it said pinning on any person or classified records and take
office in the central Ger- Thomas Haldenwang, the was taken at a 2002 rally group. other steps to counter -right
man city of Kassel. head of Germany’s domes- of the neo-Nazi NPD party Fellow politicians and ex- extremism that “continues
He was known for a strong tic intelligence service BfV, in Kassel. Authorities said it tremism experts have ac- to be played down.”
stance in favor of the wel- said the suspect hadn’t was not clear if the suspect, cused the far-right Alterna- Josef Schuster, head of
coming refugee policy been on the agency’s ra- identified only as Stephan tive for Germany party of Germany’s Central Coun-
Merkel adopted during an dar for the past decade. E., was a member of the contributing to a climate of cil of Jews, said right-wing
immigration influx in 2015, He said authorities can’t party. hatred that led to the fatal extremists are increasing-
when hundreds of thou- monitor all of Germany’s Seehofer said investigators shooting of a public official. ly talking about “armed
sands of people fleeing war estimated 12,700 violent were trying to determine German lawmaker Mi- struggle” and cautioned
and persecution sought far-right extremists around whether the accused man chael Brand, a member of that “this should be taken
shelter in Germany. the clock. acted alone or was part of Merkel’s Christian Demo- seriously.”q