AP News, March 31st, 2007
Crimes by right-wing extremists and attacks on foreigners rose in Germany last year, the government said Friday.
The number of right-wing crimes was up 14 percent and violent attacks on foreigners rose by 37 percent, the German Interior Ministry said.
More than 18,000 right-wing hate crimes were registered in Germany last year, up from 15,900 in 2005.
Of those, 511 were defined as violent attacks on foreigners and immigrants _ an increase of 37 percent compared to 2005, when 373 violent anti-foreigner crimes were reported.
The total number of politically motivated crimes, which also includes crimes by leftist groups, rose by about 10 percent to 29,050 cases.
"The numbers reported for 2006 in the area of politically motivated criminality are cause for worry," Interior Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said in a statement. "Unfortunately, our manifold efforts to fight (extremist crimes) have not yet led to a decrease of this criminality."
Members of far-right parties sit in three regional legislatures in formerly communist east Germany, where unemployment remains high some 17 years after the country's 1990 reunification. Although the extremists remain a fringe movement, many officials have called for a stronger effort against the spread of their ideology.
Officials said there was no detailed analysis accompanying the numbers about why the statistics had risen. Some experts have pointed to the electoral successes as encouraging the movement. Schaeuble said the intense police scrutiny before and during last year's World Cup soccer tournament may have contributed to more reporting.
Inciting racial hatred, denying the Holocaust and displaying Nazi symbols are all crimes in Germany.
