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Federal police conduct ‘largest ever’ nationwide raid against human trafficking

German federal police launched a crackdown in 12 federal states on human trafficking and organized crime on Wednesday morning.

Published: 18 April 2018 09:58 CEST
Federal police conduct ‘largest ever’ nationwide raid against human trafficking
Police raiding a house in Bonn on Wednesday. Photo: DPA

The coordinated raids, which several officials said was the biggest in the decades-long history of the force, are targeting human traffickers and criminals involved in forced prostitution.

More than 1,500 police officers have been deployed nationwide, including Germany’s GSG9 elite SWAT teams.

Over 60 residential and business premises have been searched.

The federal police in North Rhine-Westphalia reported that numerous arrest warrants have been issued and several people have already been arrested, among them a 59-year-old Thai woman and resident in Siegen. “But there will be more (arrests),” a spokesman said.

The raids are primarily aimed at a group of around 15 to 20 people of German and Thai nationality. The woman arrested is suspected of being a leader of the gang.

Among other things, the gang has been accused of human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and the exploitation of prostitutes. The alleged perpetrators are suspected of smuggling several hundred people from Thailand to Germany and forcing them into prostitution.

The raids, which are also being conducted in brothels and massage studios, are expected to continue throughout the day on Wednesday.

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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.

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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