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CRIME

German neo-Nazis march in Czech town

Nearly 500 far-right militants from the Czech Republic and Germany rallied late Saturday to mark the 64th anniversary of punishing Allied air raids on the Czech city of Usti nad Labem, near the German border.

German neo-Nazis march in Czech town
Photo: DPA

No serious incidents were seen, as police kept a close eye on the protest that critics branded a pretext for marking Monday’s birth anniversary of Nazi German dictator Adolf Hitler.

Some 1,250 police officers, including 750 riot police, were mobilised, said police colonel Oldrich Zeman, in a security operation that included the seizure of guns, knives and baseball bats.

Police said they averted possible clashes between the neo-Nazis and some 200 counter-demonstrators, mainly anarchists.

“Police will be on the alert all night,” regional police spokeswoman Jarmila Hrubesova told AFP but would not give a figure of those arrested.

Most of the participants were young people dressed in black. They began their rally with speeches in Lidice Square, named in memory of a Czech village where German forces massacred all 192 menfolk in a June 1942 atrocity.

The protest was comparable to “a dance of the assassins, on the mass grave” of the victims of Nazism, said Miroslav Broz, a member of a local group opposed to the presence of neo-Nazis in Usti nad Labem.

Two months ago, nearly 6,000 neo-Nazis paraded through nearby Dresden, across the border in eastern Germany, to mark the Allied bombing of that city on February 13-14, 1945. Police made several dozen arrests.

Historians say Allied air raids on Usti nad Labem in April 1945, within days of the end of World War II, targeted the railway station — a strategic site for the Nazis after the Dresden bombings — as well as SS barracks and the local branch of the Nazi party.

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BUSINESS

Elon Musk visits Tesla’s sabotage-hit German factory

Elon Musk travelled Wednesday to Tesla's factory near Berlin to lend his workers "support" after the plant was forced to halt production by a suspected arson attack on nearby power lines.

Elon Musk visits Tesla's sabotage-hit German factory

The Tesla CEO addressed thousands of employees on arrival at the site, accusing “eco-terrorists” of the sabotage as he defended his company’s green credentials.

With his son X AE A-XII in his arms, Musk said: “I am here to support you.”

The billionaire’s visit came a week after power lines supplying the electric carmaker’s only European plant were set on fire in an act of sabotage claimed by a far-left group called the Vulkangruppe (Volcano Group).

READ ALSO: Far-left group claims ‘sabotage’ on Tesla’s German factory

Musk had said then that the attack was “extremely dumb”, while the company said it would cost it several hundred million euros.

A week on, the lights have come back on at the site, but Andre Thierig, who heads the site, said on LinkedIn that it would “take a bit of time” before production is back to full speed.

Industry experts have warned that the reputational impact caused by the sabotage on the region could be more severe than the losses suffered by Tesla.

Tesla’s German plant started production in 2022 following an arduous two-year approval and construction process dogged by administrative and legal obstacles.

Tesla wants to expand the site by 170 hectares and boost production up to one million vehicles annually to feed Europe’s growing demand for electric cars and take on rivals who are shifting away from combustion engine vehicles.

But the plans have annoyed local residents, who voted against the project in a non-binding ballot last month.

After the vote, Tesla said it might have to rethink the plans. Environmental activists opposed to the expansion of the factory have recently also set up a camp in a wooded area near the plant.

READ ALSO: Why is Tesla’s expansion near Berlin so controversial?

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