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CRIME

Biker gang member shot dead in Berlin

A member of a biker gang has been shot and killed in Berlin’s Hohenschönhausen district, police reported on Friday.

Biker gang member shot dead in Berlin
Photo: DPA

“Despite immediate resuscitation attempts, a man in Hohenschönhausen died (Thursday) night after he was shot on the street by unknown perpetrators,” a statement said.

News agency DPA reported that the 33-year-old man dragged himself some 200 metres after being shot before he collapsed.

Residents of Ernst-Barlach-Straße heard several gunshots on the street and called police, who found the unresponsive man shortly thereafter in front of an apartment building.

According to the police statement, the man is known as a member of the biker gang scene, though they refused to speculate whether his death was related to ongoing conflict between the Bandidos and the Hells Angels. Violence between the two groups escalated in recent months, particularly in the north, where police have called territorial fighting “explosive.”

Both a homicide squad and specialists for organised crime from the state’s criminal investigation office are on the case. Witnesses told DPA that the crime scene was teeming with officers overnight and the surrounding road was closed for several hours.

Autopsy results for the man are expected late on Friday.

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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.

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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