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CRIME

Deutsche Post CEO’s home and office raided

Deutsche Post, Germany’s former mail carrier monopoly, now the world’s largest logistics group, confirmed on Thursday that CEO Klaus Zumwinkel is being investigated by prosecutors and his offices have been searched. The public prosecutor’s office is investigating whether or not the high powered business man has evaded taxes by placing €10 million in Liechtenstein.

Published: 14 February 2008 16:27 CET

“We don’t know anything,” said a spokesperson for the police. ZDF, a German broadcaster, reported that the raids in the company headquarters and at Zumwinkel’s house began at simultaneously 7am. The operation was secretly planned for weeks, according to reports.

A former McKinsey consultant, Zumwinkel is one of the longest serving CEOs in Germany. Having been at the helm of Deutsche Post for 19 years, Zumwinkel oversaw the company’s privatization and global expansion. He also is on the advisory board of Deutsche Telekom and Postbank.

CRIME

Teenager turns self in after attack on German politician

A 17-year-old has turned himself in to police in Germany after an attack on a lawmaker that the country's leaders decried as a threat to democracy.

Published: 5 May 2024 12:52 CEST
Teenager turns self in after attack on German politician

The teenager reported to police in the eastern city of Dresden early Sunday morning and said he was “the perpetrator who had knocked down the SPD politician”, police said in a statement.

Matthias Ecke, 41, European parliament lawmaker for Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD), was set upon by four attackers as he put up EU election posters in Dresden on Friday night, according to police.

Ecke was “seriously injured” and required an operation after the attack, his party said.

Scholz on Saturday condemned the attack as a threat to democracy.

“We must never accept such acts of violence,” he said.

Ecke, who is head of the SPD’s European election list in the Saxony region, was just the latest political target to be attacked in Germany.

Police said a 28-year-old man putting up posters for the Greens had been “punched” and “kicked” earlier in the evening on the same Dresden street.

Last week two Greens deputies were abused while campaigning in Essen in western Germany and another was surrounded by dozens of demonstrators in her car in the east of the country.

According to provisional police figures, 2,790 crimes were committed against politicians in Germany in 2023, up from 1,806 the previous year, but less than the 2,840 recorded in 2021, when legislative elections took place.

A group of activists against the far right has called for demonstrations against the attack on Ecke in Dresden and Berlin on Sunday, Der Spiegel magazine said.

According to the Tagesspiegel newspaper, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser is planning to call a special conference with Germany’s regional interior ministers next week to address violence against politicians.

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