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CRIME

Rape victim, 12, secretly filmed attack

A 12-year-old girl who was raped repeatedly by her ageing stepfather filmed an attack as evidence using a secret video camera in her room, a North Rhine-Westphalia court heard this week.

Rape victim, 12, secretly filmed attack
Photo: DPA

Cologne daily Express reported on Wednesday that the girl from the Rhineland city of Mülheim installed a concealed video camera in her room after she had already been raped at least 17 times over several years.

Her stepfather, 70-year-old Greek Georgios A., denied the allegations, the paper reported.

“I have never seduced her, rather her me, I swear it,” he said through a Greek-German interpreter. “She must have put something in my drink. I don’t remember anything.”

The state prosecutor accuses the man of seriously sexually assaulting the girl, who is now 13, at least 17 times between 2006 and May 2010.

“I want you. We’ll do it now, my girl,” the man is alleged to have said before each attack.

The man also tied the girl up and threatened to kill her, prosecutors say.

The girl hatched her plan in May, hiding the camera in her room. When her stepfather raped her, the attack was recorded.

“You can clearly recognize in the images who is the perpetrator and who is the victim here,” judge Christoph Kaufmann said, according to the paper.

The girl showed the pictures to her teacher and her stepfather was promptly arrested. Because he continued to deny the charges, the victim had to testify for several hours on Tuesday, during which she clung to a teddy bear.

The girl now lives in a foster home and is “traumatised,” the paper said. Her mother moved to another country after the case became public knowledge.

The court is expected to rule on the case on October 8.

The Local/dw

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CRIME

Aide to German far-right MEP arrested on suspicion of spying for China

An aide to a German far-right politician standing in June's European Union elections has been arrested on suspicion of spying for China, German prosecutors said on Tuesday.

Aide to German far-right MEP arrested on suspicion of spying for China

The man, named only as Jian G., stands accused of sharing information about negotiations at European Parliament with a Chinese intelligence service and of spying on Chinese opposition figures in Germany, federal prosecutors said in a statement.

On the website of the European Parliament, Jian Guo is listed as an accredited assistant to MEP Maximilian Krah, the far-right AfD party’s lead candidate in the forthcoming EU-wide elections.

He is a German national who has reportedly worked as an aide to Krah in Brussels since 2019.

The suspect “is an employee of a Chinese secret service”, prosecutors said.

“In January 2024, the accused repeatedly passed on information about negotiations and decisions in the European Parliament to his intelligence service client.

“He also spied on Chinese opposition members in Germany for the intelligence service.”

The suspect was arrested in the eastern German city of Dresden on Monday and his homes were searched, they added.

The accused lives in both Dresden and Brussels, according to broadcasters ARD, RBB and SWR, who broke the news about the arrest.

The AfD said the allegations were “very disturbing”.

“As we have no further information on the case, we must wait for further investigations by federal prosecutors,” party spokesman Michael Pfalzgraf said in a statement.

The case is likely to fuel concern in the West about aggressive Chinese espionage.

It comes after Germany on Monday arrested three German nationals suspected of spying for China by providing access to secret maritime technology.

READ ALSO: Germany arrests three suspected of spying for China

China’s embassy in Berlin “firmly” rejected the allegations, according to Chinese state-run news agency Xinhua.

According to German media, the two cases are not connected.

In Britain on Monday, two men were charged with handing over “articles, notes, documents or information” to China between 2021 and last year.

Police named the men as Christopher Berry, 32, and Christoper Cash, 29, who previously worked at the UK parliament as a researcher.

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