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Police raids target users of illegal online forum in Germany

Police in Germany have arrested 32 people and detained 11 after nationwide raids targeting users of an illegal online platform, prosecutors in Frankfurt and Bamberg said Wednesday.

Published: 24 June 2020 16:25 CEST

Police raids target users of illegal online forum in Germany

Photo: DPA

More than 1,400 police were involved in the raids in 15 of Germany's 16 states and in neighbouring Austria and Poland on Tuesday, said prosecutors in Bamberg, in the southern state of Bavaria.

READ ALSO: German police shut down major 'darknet' illegal trading site

Police said they found weapons, drugs, computers, around €50,000 in cash, cryptocurrency and more than 300 terabytes of data in the raids on 232 sites.

The raids targeted users of crimenetwork.co, an “underground economy forum that trades almost exclusively in illegal goods and services” according to the Frankfurt prosecutors.

These include drugs and narcotics, counterfeit money, data including credit card information, forged documents and cash, malware and hacker tools including botnets.

Then aged 26, the administrator of the forum was arrested on entering Germany in May 2019 on a separate charge and the site was seized by police.

Authorities across several German states have been investigating users of the platform since August.

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Germany raids properties in bribery probe aimed at AfD politician

The investigation targets Petr Bystron, the number-two candidate for the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party in next month’s European Parliament elections, Der Spiegel news outlet reported.

Police, and prosecutors in Munich, confirmed on Thursday they were conducting “a preliminary investigation against a member of the German Bundestag on the initial suspicion of bribery of elected officials and money laundering”, without giving a name.

Properties in Berlin, the southern state of Bavaria and the Spanish island of Mallorca were searched and evidence seized, they said in a statement.

About 70 police officers and 11 prosecutors were involved in the searches.

Last month, Bystron denied media reports that he was paid to spread pro-Russian views on a Moscow-financed news website, just one of several scandals that the extreme-right anti-immigration AfD is battling.

READ ALSO: How spying scandal has rocked troubled German far-right party

Bystron’s offices in the German parliament, the Bundestag, were searched after lawmakers voted to waive the immunity usually granted to MPs, his party said.

The allegations against Bystron surfaced in March when the Czech government revealed it had bust a Moscow-financed network that was using the Prague-based Voice of Europe news site to spread Russian propaganda across Europe.

Did AfD politicians receive Russian money?

Czech daily Denik N said some European politicians cooperating with the news site were paid from Russian funds, in some cases to fund their European Parliament election campaigns.

It singled out the AfD as being involved.

Denik N and Der Spiegel named Bystron and Maximilian Krah, the AfD’s top candidate for the European elections, as suspects in the case.

After the allegations emerged, Bystron said that he had “not accepted any money to advocate pro-Russian positions”.

Krah has denied receiving money for being interviewed by the site.

On Wednesday, the European Union agreed to impose a broadcast ban on the Voice of Europe, diplomats said.

The AfD’s popularity surged last year, when it capitalised on discontent in Germany at rising immigration and a weak economy, but it has dropped back in the face of recent scandals.

As well as the Russian propaganda allegations, the party has faced a Chinese spying controversy and accusations that it discussed the idea of mass deportations with extremists, prompting a wave of protests across Germany.

READ ALSO: Germany, Czech Republic accuse Russia of cyberattacks

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