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CRIME

Germany charges 100-year-old former Nazi camp guard

A 100-year-old former concentration camp guard has been charged with complicity in 3,518 murders as Germany races to bring surviving Nazi staff to justice, prosecutors told AFP on Monday.

Germany charges 100-year-old former Nazi camp guard
A former watchtower on the grounds of the Sachsenhausen memorial site. Photo: DPA

The man stands accused of “knowingly and willingly” assisting in the murder of prisoners at the Sachsenhausen camp in Oranienburg, north of Berlin, between 1942 and 1945.

He is considered fit to stand trial despite his age, the public prosecutor's office in the town of Neuruppin confirmed after the story was reported by the NDR broadcaster.

The case comes days after German prosecutors charged a former secretary at a Nazi concentration camp with complicity in the murders of 10,000 people, in the first such case in recent years against a woman.

The 95-year-old accused had worked at the Stutthof camp near what was Danzig, now Gdansk, in then Nazi-occupied Poland.

Germany has been hunting down former Nazi staff since the 2011 conviction of former guard John Demjanjuk on the basis he served as part of the Nazi killing machine set a legal precedent.

Since then, courts have handed down several guilty verdicts on those grounds rather than for murders or atrocities directly linked to the individual accused.

Among those who were brought to late justice were Oskar Gröning, an accountant at Auschwitz, and Reinhold Hanning, a former SS guard at the same camp.

Both were convicted of complicity in mass murder at the age of 94 but died before they could be imprisoned.

In the most recent verdict, a former SS guard, Bruno Dey, was found guilty at the age of 93 and was given a two-year suspended sentence.

A case was brought against another former guard at Stutthof in July over complicity in the murder of several hundred people.

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CRIME

Nine face trial in Germany for alleged far-right coup plot

The first members of a far-right group that allegedly plotted to attack the German parliament and overthrow the government will go on trial in Stuttgart on Monday.

Nine face trial in Germany for alleged far-right coup plot

Nine suspected participants in the coup plot will take the stand in the first set of proceedings to open in the sprawling court case, split among three courts in three cities.

The suspects are accused of having participated in the “military arm” of the organisation led by the minor aristocrat and businessman Prince Heinrich XIII Reuss.

The alleged plot is the most high-profile recent case of far-right violence, which officials say has grown to become the biggest extremist threat in Germany.

The organisation led by Reuss was an eclectic mix of characters and included, among others, a former special forces soldier, a former far-right MP, an astrologer, and a well-known chef.

Reuss, along with other suspected senior members of the group, will face trial in the second of the three cases, in Frankfurt in late May.

The group aimed to install him as head of state after its planned takeover.

Heinrich XIII arrested at his home following a raid in 2022.

Heinrich XIII arrested at his home following a raid in 2022. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Boris Roessler

The alleged plotters espoused a mix of “conspiracy myths” drawn from the global QAnon movement and the German Reichsbûrger (Citizens of the Reich) scene, according to prosecutors.

The Reichsbürger movement includes right-wing extremists and gun enthusiasts who reject the legitimacy of the modern German republic.

Its followers generally believe in the continued existence of the pre-World War I German Reich, or empire, under a monarchy, and several groups have declared their own states.

Such Reichsbürger groups were driven by “hatred of our democracy”, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said in Berlin on Sunday.

“We will continue our tough approach until we have fully exposed and dismantled militant ‘Reichsbürger’ structures,” she added.

READ ALSO: Who was involved in the alleged plot to overthrow German democracy?

‘Treasonous undertaking’

According to investigators, Reuss’s group shared a belief that Germany was run by members of a “deep state” and that the country could be liberated with the help of a secret international alliance.

The nine men to stand trial in Stuttgart are accused by prosecutors of preparing a “treasonous undertaking” as part of the Reichsbürger plot.

As part of the group, they are alleged to have aimed to “forcibly eliminate the existing state order” and replace it with their own institutions.

The members of the military arm were tasked with establishing, supplying and recruiting new members for “territorial defence companies”, according to prosecutors.

Among the accused are a special forces soldier, identified only as Andreas M. in line with privacy laws, who is said to have used his access to scout out army barracks.

Others were allegedly responsible for the group’s IT systems or were tasked with liaising with the fictitious underground “alliance”, which they thought would rally to the plotters’ aid when the coup was launched.

The nine include Alexander Q., who is accused by federal prosecutors of acting as the group’s propagandist, spreading conspiracy theories via the Telegram messaging app.

Two of the defendants, Markus L. and Ralf S., are accused of weapons offences in addition to the charge of treason.

Markus L. is also accused of attempted murder for allegedly turning an assault rifle on police and injuring two officers during a raid at his address in March 2023.

Police swooped in to arrest most of the group in raids across Germany in December 2022 and the charges were brought at the end of last year.

Three-part trial 

Proceedings in Stuttgart are set to continue until early 2025.

In all, 26 people are accused in the huge case against the extremist network, with trials also set to open in Munich and Frankfurt.

Reuss will stand trial in Frankfurt from May 21st, alongside another ringleader, an ex-army officer identified as Ruediger v.P., and a former MP for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, Birgit Malsack-Winkemann.

The Reichsbürger group had allegedly organised a “council” to take charge after their planned putsch, with officials warning preparations were at an advanced stage.

The alleged plotters had resources amounting to 500,000 euros ($536,000) and a “massive arsenal of weapons”, according to federal prosecutors.

Long dismissed as malcontents and oddballs, believers in Reichsbuerger-type conspiracies have become increasingly radicalised in recent years and are seen as a growing security threat.

Earlier this month, police charged a new suspect in relation to another coup plot.

The plotters, frustrated with pandemic-era restrictions, planned to kidnap the German health minister, according to investigators.

Five other suspected co-conspirators in that plot went on trial in Koblenz last May.

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