Rudolf Flükiger

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Rudolf Flükiger (* 1955 or 1956; † 1977 ) was a Swiss soldier who died in the autumn of 1977 under unknown circumstances.

His death was attributed to a suicide or a crime committed by Jurassic separatists or RAF terrorists and kept the Swiss public busy for years. However, a criminal background to the death could never be proven.

Death and investigation

Flükiger was a 21-year-old Bernese officer aspirant , who on the parade ground Bure in time still to Canton Bern belonging Jura the military school graduated. On September 16, 1977, he did not return to the barracks after a nightly guard run. His body was not found until four weeks later, north of the nearby border on French territory in the Belfort area . The body was torn to pieces by a hand grenade .

The Swiss forensic doctors considered suicide to be the cause of death with a "high probability", while the French also considered outside interference to be possible. However, the suicide thesis was soon publicly questioned - on the one hand because there was no apparent motive for the suicide of the popular young soldier, and on the other hand because the death was soon linked to possible activities by criminal groups.

Separatists

In the 1970s, the Jura was shaped by the Jurassic conflict. This conflict over whether the Jura belongs to Bern sometimes resulted in riots between separatists and those who were loyal to Bern, and in this context separatists also carried out arson and explosive attacks.

Two days after Flükiger's body was found, a local newspaper received an anonymous letter. The author, allegedly a separatist, wrote that he and others had kidnapped Flükiger in order to release him naked on the Bundesplatz in Bern. But he suffocated on vomit in the trunk of the car, after which it was decided to fake suicide.

The « Bund » journalist Edgar R. Minder researched the case intensively and came to the conclusion that separatists had kidnapped Flükiger. As only became known in 2017, Justice Minister Kurt Furgler succeeded in 1981 in bringing about the end of Minder's reporting on the case with Bund editor-in-chief Paul Schaffroth . In a personal conversation, Furgler stated that reports of unprovable suspicions would put a heavy burden on the young canton of Jura and could have political consequences.

On the night of September 17, the day after Flükiger's disappearance, strangers blocked the access to the holiday homes of German-speaking Swiss in the Jura. In 1983 a French newspaper reported that this action had been planned by separatists from the Aigle inn in Grandfontaine , whose nightly meeting the Bern canton police had drawn up an internal report. The newspaper report led to Flükiger's death once again being publicly linked to the separatists. In the Swiss Federal Assembly , National Councilor Valentin Oehen , who accused the authorities of covering up, and Furgler violently attacked each other over the case.

RAF

Not only Jurassic separatists, the German RAF may have been active in the Jura at this time. Before Christmas 1977, the German terrorists Gabriele Kröcher-Tiedemann and Christian Möller exchanged gunfire with Swiss customs officers while attempting to escape to Switzerland near Fahy near Bure and were later arrested in the Jura. The maps found on them suggested that the RAF had set up a retreat in the Jura.

At the time, the Swiss authorities were investigating whether there was any contact between local smugglers, separatists and terrorists. For example, a note from the French secret service became public that the RAF had transported the murdered Hanns Martin Schleyer through the Jura to Alsace in October 1977 . The Swiss press also speculated about a connection between Flükiger's death and the actions of the RAF. However, these considerations never led to tangible results.

swell

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Federal Councilor Furgler stopped the research , Berner Zeitung of September 28, 2017
personal data
SURNAME Flükiger, Rudolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss soldier who died in unknown circumstances
DATE OF BIRTH 1955 or 1956
DATE OF DEATH September 1977 or October 1977