Sexual assault on New Year's Eve 2015

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The square in front of the entrance building of Cologne Central Station (left), north of Cologne Cathedral (2010)

On the night of 31 December 2015 to 1 January 2016 came in Cologne in the area of the main station and Dom to numerous sexual assaults on women by groups of young men mainly from the North African and Arab region. In many cases sexual offenses as well as property and bodily harm offenses were committed. Approx. 1200 criminal charges were filed in the following period . About half also involved sexual offenses. 290 suspects were identified, 37 of whom were convicted, six of them for sexual assault . The attacks received great national and international attention.

The police and the federal police were accused of not having the situation under control and of euphemizing it in initial reports. A late and initially cautious media reporting was also criticized.

Events in Cologne

Chronology of events

New Years Eve

According to the police, in the last hours of December 31, 2015, “at times more than 1,000 people had gathered at Cologne Central Station“ on the station forecourt and the adjoining stairs to the Domplatte ”in front of the north side of the cathedral. Most of them were male people between the ages of 15 and 35, who by the external impression came from the North African / Arab region. ”The persons ( called “ Nafris ” in the jargon of the North Rhine-Westphalia police force ) were from the For the most part, emergency services were described as “heavily alcoholized” and “completely disinhibited and aggressive”. Even before midnight, the police had temporarily evacuated the station forecourt because fireworks were set off in the crowd and, according to the police, threatened mass panic . On the forecourt as well as in the inner area of ​​the main train station and around the Cologne Cathedral adjoining the station forecourt to the south, predominantly women were surrounded by groups of men of different sizes and were massively sexually molested , insulted or sexually coerced and robbed. The victims later described in interviews how they had been touched again and again and all over the body, especially between the legs, and how one tried to take their clothes off while the perpetrators reached into their pockets at the same time. Attempts to get help from the police in this situation have failed.

The police operation lasted from 9:45 p.m. to 7:30 a.m. Up to 143 Cologne state police officers and 70 federal police officers were on duty. According to their own statements, the Cologne police received the first indications of a large number of serious crimes around 1:00 a.m. The police established personal details in 71 cases. The majority of the people from the North African / Arab region identified themselves as asylum seekers through a registration certificate from the Federal Office for Migration . There were ten evictions, five arrests and eleven arrests.

Local situation

  • Center of the picture, from left: Cologne Central Station , station forecourt, steps and Domplatte , Cologne Cathedral (2006)

  • Station forecourt and reception building of Cologne Central Station at night (2010)

  • Steps from the station forecourt to the Domplatte with the north entrance of Cologne Cathedral (2009)

  • From left: reception building, station forecourt, steps to Domplatte, Cologne Cathedral (2016)

Police press releases and reactions from victims and the press

Tweet from the Cologne police about New Year's Day

A first press release from the Cologne police on New Year's morning was titled "Exuberant atmosphere - celebrations largely peaceful".

Around noon, the first victims and eyewitnesses of the attacks reported to the Facebook group “Nett-Werk Köln”. A journalist from the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger contacted one of the victims, who told her about the conditions at the main train station. A police spokeswoman, on the other hand, said on request that only one crime with a sexual background could be found on the service computer. At 1:21 pm, the newspaper was the first to report on the events: "Sexual harassment on New Year's Eve - women in Cologne's main train station massively harassed". During the course of the day, the editorial staff received further emails from witnesses and victims, but the police still did not confirm the allegations.

On the morning of January 2, the police reporter for the Stadt-Anzeiger received a call from a high-ranking official who reported that the police had long been assuming serious crimes internally, contrary to what was publicly reported. More than 30 victims have already reported that there are more than 40 perpetrators. The newspaper published the information promptly. In the afternoon, police confirmed the new information in a press release covering a series of attacks on women.

Press releases from the mayor and police chief

Press conference in Cologne on January 5th, Mayor Henriette Reker (left), Police President Wolfgang Albers (center)

On January 5th, a joint press conference was held by Cologne's Lord Mayor Henriette Reker and Cologne's Police President Wolfgang Albers . Reker said that the authorities had no evidence that the perpetrators were refugees. She considers corresponding assumptions to be "absolutely inadmissible". Nothing is known about the actual number of perpetrators and their identities. Albers explained that the fact that (at the time) 90 criminal charges did not automatically mean 90 perpetrators. There is currently no information about the perpetrators. He also admitted mistakes. The first information on New Year's Day was wrong.

On January 8th, Reker said in a press release that she had only received “information, in particular about the origin of those identified from the group of perpetrators” from the press, and she terminated Albers' trust, who shortly thereafter was put into temporary retirement . The North Rhine-Westphalian Ministry of the Interior contradicted this representation: Albers had already informed Reker by telephone on January 2nd about the findings available up to that point. At a press conference on January 4th, the police said "that the intoxicated crowd were mainly people from the North African-Arab region". On January 5th, Albers Reker informed again about the state of knowledge. He also reported publicly that among the roughly 70 troublemakers checked by the police, many of the 1,000 or so people at the station forecourt had identified themselves with a “certificate of registration as an asylum seeker”. Reker's information is incomprehensible.

Delayed reporting

Regional and national

The first reports of individual sexual assaults at Cologne Central Station appeared on January 1, 2016 in the online editions of the Kölnische Rundschau , the Express , the Kölner Stadtanzeiger and in the regional section of Focus Online . On January 2nd, the news agency dpa received a report with priority level four, which was picked up by the online editions of the Süddeutsche Zeitung and RTL , among others .

In contrast, broad supra-regional reporting did not begin until January 4th. This delay is partly justified by the fact that during the extended New Year's weekend only reduced “holiday shifts” worked in the editorial offices. On January 4th, the Tagesschau (ARD) addressed the attacks at 8 p.m., in contrast to Today ( ZDF ). The next day, the deputy editor-in-chief Elmar Theveßen described this as a mistake: “The news situation was clear enough. It was a failure that the 7 pm today broadcast did not at least report the incidents. ”They wanted to wait for the crisis meeting on Tuesday to gain time for additional interviews. However, this was "a clear misjudgment". On January 5th at 7:20 pm there was a ZDF special with the topic "What happened on New Year's Eve?" On the same day at 11:05 pm, the first broadcast the special program "Excessive violence in Cologne".

Some media initially falsely reported that the acts were committed by 1,000 men. In fact, the acts were committed by a crowd of more than 1,000, almost entirely made up of young men; the number of perpetrators was smaller.

Resolution of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe held an urgent debate on January 28, 2016 and then passed Resolution No. 13961. a. to protect women from domestic as well as public violence and to condemn perpetrators consistently. The resolution also stressed that the media had "an important responsibility" to report facts objectively, timely and truthfully without stigmatizing any part of the population. They should not "hide the truth from the general public in order to ensure political correctness ." Partial, belated or unbalanced reporting on crime could " promote conspiracy theories, fuel hatred against part of the population and contribute to distrust of authorities and the media".

International media

The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal covered the events in Cologne on their front pages. Such a media presence of German issues in US newspapers is - according to the Tagesspiegel - very rare.

The New York Times columnist Ross Douthat warned of the consequences of rapid, uncontrolled mass immigration, especially of young men. He recommended that Germany close the borders to newcomers, deport healthy refugees and give up the foolish illusion (“fond illusion”) that it could wash itself of the sins of the past through daring humanitarian actions. He called for the resignation of Chancellor Angela Merkel so that her country and the continent he dominated would not have to pay too high a price for her “high-minded folly”.

The BBC - chief correspondent Gavin Hewitt noted, the audacity of the attacks and the feeling of a powerless government would continue to pursue the victims, but most of all trust is lost, the essential cement of every society. There is now a widespread distrust that the political elite has not been honest with the people and is hiding the truth.

Work-up

Criminal charges and suspects

By February 10, 1054 criminal charges had been recorded for incidents in downtown Cologne during New Year's Eve. 454 cases were sexual offenses, including at least three reports of rape. According to evaluations by the police, two thirds of the sexual offenses and thefts had been committed in the main station and on the station forecourt, and another noticeable accumulation of offenses was found in the area of ​​the Hohenzollern Bridge . More than a hundred advertisements had already been received by New Year's morning, and from January 4th, according to initial press reports, there was a massive increase in advertisements. All in all, the police had assumed 1108 victims and injured parties by then.

According to the Cologne Public Prosecutor, 1,276 alleged victims were known by June 2016. In Cologne there were 1,182 reports on New Year's Eve, 497 of them for sexual assaults that affected 648 victims. According to reports, 284 people were victims of both sexual assault and property crime . There were 5 reports of completed rape and 16 of attempted rape.

The number of advertisements increased to 1,210 by December 2017. Of 290 suspects known by name, 101 were Algerians , 91 Moroccans , 37 Iraqis , 29 Syrians and 25 Germans. 122 accused were asylum seekers, 52 were living illegally in Germany at the time of the crime. The status of the rest was unclear.

Police investigation and analysis by the Federal Criminal Police Office

Wanted poster in German and Arabic, Cologne public prosecutor's office

The Cologne police founded a "Soko New Year", initially at 10, later (as of January 21, 2016) with 140 investigators to clear up the incidents. Among other things, she evaluated cell phone videos and material from surveillance cameras. She received assistance from officials from Scotland Yard in the United Kingdom in evaluating the video material . The investigative commission should also clarify whether the men had organized themselves through social networks. In March, photos taken by witnesses and victims were used as mug shots . Furthermore, technical detection methods for cell phone location were used to clear up the large number of cell phone thefts.

According to a confidential situation report by the Federal Criminal Police Office from the beginning of 2016, most of the victims were women between 18 and 24 years old. The 62 accused identified by the end of February were mostly "refugees / asylum seekers and people with a migration background". Around 70% of them came to Germany in the course of 2015. Two thirds of the suspects had also appeared before the police. There are no reliable indications for an agreed procedure. Instead, it was a group dynamic development that, according to international research results, could have been favored by several factors. In particular, this is a form of everyday violence against women that is widespread in North African and Asian countries - which the BKA sought to name "Taharrush gamea" by adopting an Arabic expression for collective sexual harassment - and persistent lack of prospects for the perpetrators due to the lack of opportunities for asylum Work, peer pressure to encourage each other, a feeling of anonymity and impunity as well as the fact that an intervention by the security authorities was not visible to the outside world.

In January a spokesman for the Cologne Public Prosecutor announced: "In one case, the police established that the sex offense reported did not take place like this". Another fictional rape of a 15-year-old girl in Mönchengladbach by a man with a migrant background as a suspect is interpreted by a spokesman for the police union (GdP) in connection with the events in Cologne: "After the events in Cologne, it is hardly surprising that there are free riders gives".

Legal processing

According to media reports on January 6, 2016, the attacks were rated as organized crime (OK) by the Cologne police and the Cologne public prosecutor's office , and the legal processing was therefore taken over by the Cologne public prosecutor's office. Police chief Albers had previously stated that there was “no evidence that the perpetrators had arranged to meet for their raids and sexual assaults on women on New Year's Eve”.

In January 2016, three North African asylum seekers involved were sentenced to suspended sentences of between 3 and 6 months and a youth sentence for theft.

In April 2016, an alleged main perpetrator was arrested on Lake Constance . The 19-year-old Moroccan is said to have belonged to a group of 20 to 30 men from which a woman was sexually harassed and a man was stolen, in which he is said to have made the acts possible by blocking the escape route for the victims. A shop detective observed him stealing groceries and cigarettes, followed him to neighboring Switzerland and alerted the police.

As of March 2019, 52 suspects have been charged in 43 trials, 37 of which have been completed. The allegations concern sexual assault in six of the accused. These offenders were each sentenced to one year suspended prison sentence. The other defendants had to answer mainly for theft and stolen goods. The most severely punished offender was sentenced to one year and ten months' imprisonment for robbery .

Many proceedings were dropped because no suspect could be identified. The BKA sees “obstacles to investigation” as the reason for this: there was no suitable image material, the women were unable to describe the perpetrators very well. In addition, in many cases the identity or residence status of the accused could not be clarified, the accused could not be found, or the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) and immigration authorities answered inquiries from investigators too slowly.

Investigation committee of the state parliament of North Rhine-Westphalia

An investigative committee on New Year's Eve attacks of the North Rhine-Westphalian state parliament, which was supposed to clarify the events, began at the beginning of March 2016 with the first hearing of witnesses. This sometimes led to contradicting statements. Among other things, the deployment concept of the city of Cologne was examined on New Year's Eve. Attempts were also made to explain how the downplaying press release by the Cologne police headquarters came about.

At the beginning of April, allegations were made public that the ranks of the State Ministry of the Interior had asked not to use the word "rape" in the police press release despite findings to the contrary. An internal mail came to light in which a detective from the Cologne police headquarters informed his director that the police's state control center had requested “the deletion of the phrase rape” at the request of the interior ministry. The director forwarded the note to the state director of criminal investigations in the Ministry of the Interior with the note that the call in question could be traced back from the state control center, but in Cologne it was not known who had called.

The Ministry of the Interior rejected suspicions from the media that it had tried to cancel reports on New Year's Eve or to influence wording. There were only "coordination talks" on the presentation of the facts, criminal classification and police measures with the Cologne police headquarters. However, only relevant media reports were denied, but not the representation in the mail from the Cologne detective. Members of the opposition in the state parliament accused Interior Minister Ralf Jäger of covering up and "attempting to manipulate police reports".

In an expert report for the investigative committee, after evaluating 1,020 criminal charges , the criminal psychologist Rudolf Egg came to the conclusion that the perpetrators on New Year's Eve had made an appointment through word of mouth or social media. A purely coincidental meeting of the perpetrators could “reasonably” be excluded; too many men were in the same place at the same time for that. The majority did not come to Cologne with the firm intention of committing criminal offenses. The massive attacks would probably have been prevented if the police had intervened early that evening. When it became clear that the police were not intervening, more and more men had committed attacks. Egg referred to the broken windows theory .

At the end of March 2017, the state parliament committee presented a final report comprising 1,352 pages. The state parliament of North Rhine-Westphalia discussed this on April 5, 2017.

Events in other cities

In other cities, too, there were cases on New Year's Eve in which groups committed sexual and property crimes. In a draft report, the Federal Criminal Police Office estimates that 881 sexual offenses were committed against over 1200 women across Germany. It estimates the number of perpetrators at around 2000. However, only 120 suspects could be identified, most of whom come from North Africa.

Hamburg

Great freedom in Hamburg at night (2009)

According to the Hamburg police, there were also a number of cases in which sexual harassment and robbery coincided in St. Pauli on New Year's Eve . In the crush, the women were attacked by one or sometimes several men. The women were touched on the breast or genital area. They then found that they lacked a wallet, cell phone or the like. The police spokesman said: “We know dancing as a pickpocketing trick , but what happened on New Year's Eve is an unusual phenomenon.” The victims described the perpetrators mainly as “southerners”, “North Africans” or as people “with dark skin complexion” . According to the police, there were 410 women injured in Hamburg. A total of 245 criminal charges were received. In 4 cases charges were brought, with all of the accused being acquitted and the presiding judge at the regional court strongly criticizing the investigating authorities. The majority of the crimes took place in the area of Große Freiheit , plus a few incidents on Jungfernstieg . On February 9, 2016, the Hamburg State Criminal Police Office carried out several raids nationwide together with local police forces, including Hamburg and Elmshorn , Eisenach , Eschershausen , Seevetal , Urbach and Verden (Aller) . A 22-year-old Algerian was arrested in a refugee accommodation in Eschershausen. He is suspected of being an accomplice in a rape and robbery during New Year's Eve.

Bielefeld

After the events in Cologne, the media reported nationwide about similar incidents in Bielefeld , where sexual assaults and trick theft by "Antanzen" are also said to have occurred. On New Year's Eve, for example, “up to 150 immigrants” or “up to 500” violent men gathered on “Bielefelder Boulevard”, a popular nightlife area near the train station, who tried several times to violently gain access to the Elephant disco Club to procure. Women were harassed and touched in their intimate areas and, according to the head of the disco security service, could have "only been freed using physical force". The police had to help the club repeatedly in enforcing the house rules, whereby "the aggressiveness of the men involved towards the security services was considerable". In later reports, however, the official account of a specially established 20-person police investigative group only spoke of 50 to 60 migrants who had to be forcibly prevented by bouncers from entering the Elephant Club ; five women had filed a criminal complaint, once for sexual assault and four times for “insulting on a sexual basis”. All women described the perpetrators as “men with a migration background”, and the bouncers also said that the men’s migration background was “obvious”, according to a police spokeswoman.

At the end of January, three Moroccans were arrested on Bielefeld Boulevard, accused of trespassing in connection with the events at the entrance to the Elephant Club ; Corresponding criminal charges were raised. At the same time, it became known that on January 24, 2016 in the center of Bielefeld a group of 67 bouncers, hooligans and rockers, some of whom were equipped with firearms and pyrotechnics, were encircled by their public appearance as a "hooligan vigilante" against the Bielefeld perpetrators who wanted to set New Year's Eve ”; some of the men were known to the police for violent crimes and right-wing crimes, while only 18 of them came directly from Bielefeld.

On February 4, 2016, the responsible investigation team of the Bielefeld police published a report on the preliminary investigation status with regard to the events on New Year's Eve. According to this, a total of 20 criminal proceedings will be investigated, five of which are related to sexual offenses (four times insulting on a sexual basis, once sexual assault ), three are related to bodily harm and the rest are related to theft. According to the investigation, “at peak times there were 150–200 people with a migration background” on the boulevard, while this total number “consisted of different small groups”. Three times, groups of migrants, "at the top 50–60 people", tried to "get into discos and overrun bouncers". Overall, the number of offenses on New Year's Eve on the boulevard would be "above previous experience from previous New Year's Eve, but did not correspond to the drama that was sometimes shown in public". In support of this assessment, the report states that the police were only informed of facts that were assessed as sexual crimes after being requested by the media; In addition, despite the police call, no videos or pictures of the events on New Year's Eve had been made available to the police by the time the interim report was issued.

Stuttgart

In the city ​​center on New Year's Eve around 11:30 p.m., a group of 15 male people surrounded two 18-year-old women near the Königsbau , robbed them and subsequently sexually molested them. In response to a call for witnesses by the police, other alleged victims reported who, according to the Stuttgart police, said they had experienced something similar. According to the public prosecutor's office, the attack on the two women is not comparable to the attacks at Cologne Central Station. According to the head of the police union, the incidents in both cities differed greatly in their dimensions. The victims known so far come from Stuttgart, Ulm and Constance. Since the criminal complaints were sometimes not filed promptly, but only after returning home, the investigations were more difficult.

Frankfurt am Main

In Frankfurt am Main , three women reported that they were harassed and massively immorally touched by a group of ten young men near the Eiserner Steg at 12:20 a.m. According to the criminal complaint, one of the victims had a cell phone stolen. It was about "North Africans". The men spoke bad English with an Arabic accent. Another woman reported that she and three other women had already been harassed and immorally touched by three men on the Iron Bridge at 11 p.m.

Nuremberg and the surrounding area

Four attacks from Nuremberg were on record on New Year's Eve. In Karolinenstrasse, around 20 men, according to statements by the injured party of North African appearance, harassed four women between the ages of 23 and 34 for sexual reasons. Other cases were known from the main train station , Königstrasse, the Neues Museum and from Ansbach (three victims).

Outside of Germany

Similar sexual assaults, but to a much lesser extent than in Cologne, were reported in Salzburg , Zurich and Helsinki .

Northern Europe

The Finnish police were able to prevent possibly planned attacks through prior information and detention and a strong presence on the spot. There were three advertisements in total by January 8th. The police described the nature of the attacks as "a completely new phenomenon" for Finland. In the southern Swedish city ​​of Kalmar , women were surrounded and touched by groups of men, similar to those in Cologne.

Switzerland

In Zurich , 18 women filed charges against unknown persons. They stated that they had been robbed and in some cases massively harassed. You were attacked in the crowd by several dark-skinned men. Since the public prosecutor's office was unable to identify any possible perpetrators, they dropped the case in July 2016.

Reactions

police

In an internal report , a senior police officer of the Federal Police described the situation in which the police found themselves in front of Cologne Central Station as "chaotic and shameful". The author cites too few staff and weaknesses in equipment as one of the main problems for the excessive demands of the officers. In contrast to the internal assessment by the Federal Police, the Cologne Police President Wolfgang Albers claimed that the police were "properly positioned".

The Cologne police only received two of the three requested emergency trains when planning New Year's Eve, according to the spokesman for the North Rhine-Westphalian State Office for Central Police Services (LZPD). In other places, however, three more trains from a hundred of them with a total of 114 officers were ready, which could have been moved to Cologne at short notice. On the day of the operation itself, the Cologne police could have called for additional forces: The control center in Duisburg kept in contact all night and, when the situation at the main train station became increasingly critical, offered support, which the Cologne colleagues refused. In contrast, officials who had been on duty around the station reported that they had desperately but unsuccessfully asked for additional staff and requested support several times during the night.

According to research by the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, it was already clear to the Cologne police on New Year's Eve that the group of people from whom the crimes were committed were not just "tricksters", but also men from Syria and Iraq and Afghanistan , who had only recently lived in Germany. The responsible service group leader is said to have deliberately concealed the origin of the controlled men in the WE report (WE = "important event") for the New Year's Eve deployment, contrary to the urging of the head of operations with the appropriate reasoning that this was "politically sensitive". Police chief Albers received knowledge of the WE report on New Year's morning. The editor-in-chief Peter Pauls criticized the police leadership behaving like an interrogator who never gave more information than he really had to. Only gradually did it become clear that the police's press release on New Year's morning about “peaceful celebrations” was not true: “Monday evening it was suddenly clear to me that the police leadership was loading us.” According to the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, the police followed one in their information policy Specification of the NRW Ministry of the Interior from 2008. In a circular with the title “Guidelines for the Police of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia for the Protection of National Minorities from Discrimination”, which is binding for all police authorities, the Ministry instructed the police authorities to use all terms both internally and externally Avoid, which can be misused or converted by third parties to devalue people or interpreted in their sense, unless there is an overriding interest in information or a search for it in individual cases.

On January 8th, Police President Wolfgang Albers was put into temporary retirement by NRW Interior Minister Ralf Jäger. He was accused of failing to inform the public in good time after the attacks and of withholding information about the origin of the suspects, among other things. "When asked by FDP member Marc Lürbke whether he felt like a pawn with whom the Ministry of the Interior should be taken out of the line of fire, Albers replied with a reference to the Old Testament. After reading about the scapegoat in the Book of Moses , he stated: 'There is probably something to it, yes.' "

politics

Hamburg

Olaf Scholz , then mayor of Hamburg, condemned the incidents. He announced that the perpetrators would have to face all the harshness of the law. He is glad that the incidents became public and that more women felt encouraged to file a complaint. Scholz stated that Hamburg had strengthened the police force in recent years.

North Rhine-Westphalia

Henriette Reker (independent), Lord Mayor of Cologne, told the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger that the incidents were "monstrous". It could not be acceptable that visitors to Cologne should be afraid of being attacked. "We cannot tolerate the creation of a legal vacancy here." Reker called representatives from the police and the public order office to a crisis meeting. Preventive measures were discussed in order to prevent such incidents in the future. What is new is the regulation that in future there should also be security concepts for large events without an official organizer. There should be a “behavior catalog” for young women and girls. One of its rules is to keep "arm's length" from strangers, not to leave your own group, to ask other people for help if necessary, to intervene as a witness or to inform the police. There should also be rules of conduct for carnivalists "from other cultures". Reker's “rules of conduct” for women were sharply criticized as a victim accusation based on social media .

Prime Minister Hannelore Kraft (SPD) asked the judiciary and police to act consistently. Interior Minister Ralf Jäger ( SPD ) told the Kölner Express : "We do not accept that North African men's groups organize themselves to humiliate defenseless women with brazen sexual attacks." It is necessary that the police investigate consistently and show presence as a deterrent . Everything will be done to ensure that such an incident does not happen again at Carnival.

The interior expert of the CDU parliamentary group, Gregor Golland , criticized the police president. The events on New Year's Eve showed that he “definitely does not have the situation in Cologne under control”. The Cologne Greens drew a parallel to the outbreak of violence at the demonstration " Hooligans against Salafists " at the back entrance of Cologne Central Station in autumn 2014. The police could not have got the events under control, criticize parliamentary group leader Kirsten Jahn and parliamentary group manager Jörg Frank .

National

general evaluation

On January 5th, Chancellor Merkel called Cologne Mayor Henriette Reker. She was outraged by these "disgusting assaults and sexual attacks," which demanded a tough response from the rule of law. Everything must be done to quickly and completely identify and punish the perpetrators.

Federal Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière (CDU) condemned the incidents as "hideous and unacceptable"; the obvious involvement of people with a migration background in the crimes should “not lead to refugees of any origin who seek protection from persecution with us being placed under general suspicion”.

Federal Minister of Justice Heiko Maas (SPD) spoke of a "new dimension in organized crime". He told the media: "If a thousand people come together to form an uninhibited horde and it was apparently planned that way, then it is nothing less than a temporary break in civilization ."

The former Federal Minister Kristina Schröder (CDU) called for a discussion of “violence-legitimizing masculinity norms in Muslim culture”. The subject of "the violence of many young Muslim men under no circumstances should be kept silent." The image of women many Muslim men, Schröder continued, could be seen as a possible cause of the attacks on New Year's Eve. “In this notion, it is then considered legitimate to dishonorly approach women who do not submit to this notion of an honorable woman.” Julia Klöckner (CDU) also called for a debate on “Muslim masculinity norms”.

Volker Beck ( Die Grünen ) demanded a self-critical analysis from the security authorities and at the same time warned "against the instrumentalization of these terrible acts for racist purposes". The Mayor of Tübingen Boris Palmer pointed out that the legal system had a loophole, so that petty criminals had practically nothing to fear in the refugee proceedings.

In the first report of the parliamentary committee of inquiry (PUA) of the state parliament it is stated: "The attacks have massively shaken trust in the constitutional ability to act and to avert danger."

Criticism of the media

The former Federal Minister of the Interior Hans-Peter Friedrich (CSU) raised serious allegations, particularly against the fee-financed public service media, and spoke of a "silent cartel". Apparently there are “news bans” as soon as it comes to allegations against foreigners. However, it is the job of journalism to describe what is really happening and not to filter what can and cannot be expected of the population. CSU General Secretary Andreas Scheuer also criticized the reporting. One should not jeopardize social cohesion through misunderstood caution, people want truth and clarity in reporting.

Demand for deportations

De Maizière spoke out in favor of facilitating the deportation of asylum seekers who have committed criminal offenses and to talk about changing the rule according to which only a prison sentence of three years or more affects the asylum procedure.

The constitutional lawyer and former Federal Defense Minister Rupert Scholz calls for more prevention and a strengthening of the rule of law. Scholz sees a growing “potential danger to public safety” from the one million refugees. According to Scholz, foreigners can already be expelled under current law, "if they only pose a threat to public safety and order, including those whose residence status has already been recognized" - this does not require a tightening of the Residence Act, just its consistent application .

The events in Cologne and other cities were reflected in the results of the closed meetings of the SPD and CDU at the beginning of the year. In its “Public Security” resolution paper, the SPD demanded that a total of 12,000 new jobs be created in the federal and state police forces by 2019. At its retreat in Mainz, the CDU party executive passed the "Mainz Declaration", which provides that asylum seekers, refugees and asylum seekers should be deprived of their right of residence if they have been convicted of a criminal offense to imprisonment, even with probation. This declaration by the CDU came about under pressure from the party base and also included a reference to the limits of Germany's absorption capacity. A policy that would have brought an upper limit for refugees into play had previously been rejected by both CDU politicians and human rights organizations. The opposition and parts of the SPD criticized the changes as a hasty reaction. The Mainz Declaration also provides for a reform of sexual criminal law; this fell short of the alternative proposal of the German Association of Women Lawyers.

In connection with the attacks on New Year's Eve, the media also generally referred to high factual hurdles for deportation .

Better equipment for the federal police

The CDU Rhineland-Palatinate called for more police, more video surveillance and stricter criminal law in a plan for internal security, which the party is said to have presented in Mainz. Union country Vice Christian Baldauf reported to have said: "We note that the current rules are too thin much to internal security be guaranteed." Matthias Lammert intended for a nationwide introduction of cameras to police uniforms - called Bodycams have spoken -.

New Sexual Criminal Law passed in 2016

Against the background of the sexual assault on New Year's Eve 2015/16, amendments were made to the draft law to tighten existing sexual criminal law . In November 2016, the revised Sexual Criminal Law was passed, which now corresponds to the Istanbul Convention . New is the inclusion of sexual harassment as a criminal offense ( § 184i StGB ) and the improvement of the legal situation of the victims in the case of sexual assault and rape . The decisive factor is “the recognizable will” of the victim, for example a verbal or non-verbal “no”, so that acts against sexual self-determination can be punished without (threatening) violence on the part of the perpetrator.

In addition, with Section 184j StGB ( criminal offenses from groups ), another criminal offense was created: in the event of sexual harassment from within a group, those who are part of such a group are liable to a prison sentence of up to two years. This aspect has been criticized on various occasions. The legal policy spokesman for the SPD, Johannes Fechner , stated that the group offense was included at the request of the CDU / CSU, but from the point of view of the SPD it was a "questionable regulation". In order to achieve a tightening of the rape paragraph, against which the Union had blocked so far, the compromise was reached.

The planned link between the amendment and a tightening of the asylum law was criticized by the Greens and the Left as “simply disproportionate”. After the first tightening in January 2016, foreign criminals who had committed sexual offenses could be expelled if they had used or threatened violence. In the further tightening of the expulsion law, the aspect of violence is no longer applicable, because the “no means no” principle applies without exception. The reasons leading to deportation are thus expanded. The opposition rejects this as “tightening through the back door” and double punishment. The law leaves the focus on women’s right to self-determination and has a racist connotation. In the individual votes, the Greens and the Left therefore only agreed to the long-demanded “No means No” rule, but not the bill as a whole.

In May 2017, the first judgment after the amendment to Section 184i StGB was presumably pronounced. A Libyan was sentenced by the Bautzen district court to four months' imprisonment without parole for Grapschens. The judge described the sentence as "exorbitant, but wanted by the legislature".

International

The Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico ( Smer-SD ) declared on January 7th that his country would not allow any more Muslim refugees into the country in response to the sexual assault on women in Cologne and Hamburg. “We don't want something to happen in Slovakia like it did in Germany,” said Fico.

Because of the incidents in Cologne, the Belgian government is planning to introduce courses for asylum seekers, in which men should be taught how to treat women respectfully, according to the State Secretary for Asylum and Immigration, Theo Francken ( N-VA ).

society

Germany

Flash mob against violent assault on January 9, 2016

In the social networks to spread messages about the events since 1 January. Angry reactions followed. NDR reporter Andreas Hilmer spoke of a "racist mob" raging on the Internet.

On January 8, Welt Online reported a noticeably increased demand in Germany for over-the-counter defense products, including pepper spray . The Association of German Gunsmiths and Arms Dealers (VDB) assumes that the incidents on New Year's Eve will fuel demand. The number of applications for the small gun license increased massively in the Cologne area as a result of the events. In other districts and communities around Cologne, the demand for gas weapons and small gun licenses also increased massively.

On January 9th, around 1000 women gathered as a flash mob at the main station to protest against violent attacks.

Counter-demonstration "Cologne against the Right" at the Pegida rally on January 9, 2016

Also on January 9th, a demonstration by the Pegida organization against the federal government's refugee policy took place in Cologne . The demonstration where u. a. was thrown at police officers with firecrackers, the police dispersed with water cannons. Pegida spoke of 3,000 demonstrators, while the media spoke of 1,300 to 1,700 Pegida demonstrators and 1,300 counter-demonstrators.

Syrians against sexism rally on January 16, 2016

The star reported that many Syrian refugees were shocked by the mob attacks on women on New Year's Eve and feared that their start in their new homeland could be made even more difficult by the criminal machinations of some immigrants. Four refugees living in North Rhine-Westphalia expressed their horror at the attacks in an open letter to the Chancellor and pledged to do what they could to prevent such crimes from happening again. On January 16, hundreds of people from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as numerous women from Germany, demonstrated against sexism on the Cologne train station forecourt under the motto Syrian refugees say no to the attacks in Cologne! . The 27-year-old Syrian Sakher Al-Mohamad, who has lived in Germany for a year, called for the demonstration on Facebook.

According to media reports in a television interview with regard to the sexual assault on New Year's Eve, the imam of Cologne's Al-Tauhid Mosque, Sami Abu-Yusuf, said: “One of the reasons why Muslim men raped or molested women is how they were dressed. When they're walking around half-naked and scented, that's what happens. It's like pouring oil on the fire! ”As a result, the public prosecutor received a number of criminal charges, including a. by Volker Beck . In a subsequent interview with the Kölner Express, Abu-Yusuf later claims that his remarks were taken out of context. He said: “Women were lightly dressed and they wore perfume as they walked through the drunken crowd. For some North Africans that was the reason to grope the women. But that doesn't mean that I believe women shouldn't dress like that. Everyone has to accept that. And if that doesn't suit you, you have to go to another country. "

The political scientist Bassam Tibi drew parallels between the events in Cologne and the civil war in Syria , in which the rape of women of hostile warring parties was a regular means of waging war. The war refugees are not only victims of violence, but also many perpetrators, including numerous Islamists. The rapists are not only concerned with the "sexual attraction" of European women, but also with the European men whose honor they want to tarnish. They believed they knew from advertising that every European had a luxury apartment, a car and a “pretty blonde” and that they too would get this and share in the prosperity. In the emergency shelters they felt betrayed and finally took revenge on European women on behalf of them.

The historian and violence researcher Jörg Baberowski claimed that the attacks were an "appointment". The place was deliberately chosen as a Christian crime scene, the message of the perpetrators is: "You cannot defend your wives." While rapists are killed by the victims' fathers in their home countries, this does not happen in Germany, which is interpreted as weakness. All the more so because here “the violence is being carried out in front of the eyes of the state” while the police are watching.

The publicist and polemicist Henryk M. Broder saw the attacks in Cologne as a pogrom : “As befits a pogrom, there were perpetrators, victims and spectators. The perpetrators were ruthless, the victims helpless and the spectators watched [...] A person who has to run the gauntlet , being touched, harassed, beaten and mocked, is rape. You don't have to be a historian or anti-Semitism expert to see parallels to the anti-Jewish pogroms from before the Holocaust . "

"Cologne Embassy"

On January 21, 2016, the Stadt-Anzeiger published the Cologne Embassy an appeal from local personalities from the church, media, sport, culture, literature and science with the title: No tolerance of sexual violence, fight against gang-type crime, consequences of the failure of the authorities and that's it with xenophobic agitation . Among the authors and first signatories are Frank Schätzing , Christiane Woopen , Wolfgang Niedecken , Navid Kermani , Rosemarie Trockel , Werner Spinner , Rainer Maria Woelki , Mariele Millowitsch , Bettina Böttinger and Fatih Çevikkollu .

France

New Year's Eve in Cologne was also an important topic in France. According to Claude Habib , professor of French literature at the Sorbonne Nouvelle , France has a long history of integration. But the much-cited education did not bring any success. French women learned much earlier than Germans that in certain zones at certain times it was important to lower your eyes and swap skirts for trousers. The "lost territories of the republic" were initially lost for women. And because of the same “cocktails of intimidation and harassment” as in Cologne, which, unlike in Germany, was quieter in France and received less attention. She advocated systematic, appropriate punishment for sexual abuse and made media coverage an obligation to provide attentive and objective information about sexual assaults against immigrants. For the philosopher Alain Finkielkraut , Germany woke up “after a welcome frenzy with a bad hangover”. Germany saw the arrival of the refugees as an opportunity to "eradicate a historical blot". However, "a large number of migrants have no intention of conforming to the customs and fundamental rights of Western societies". Quoting the politician Jean-Louis Bourlanges , he said that “Cologne has made us discover what a clash of civilizations ” means in everyday life. The Algerian writer Kamel Daoud described Cologne as the “European cultural capital of confrontation”. Do not imagine the "great sexual misery" of the Muslim countries and the promises of a "porno-Islamism" to recruit young Islamists. The “unbearable tension between the veiling in this world and the promised orgy in the hereafter is released either through aggression and explosion or through denial and veiling. In the lands of Allah sex is a promise through death, not love, and sexuality is a crime unless it is codified by religion and consequently killed as an earthly desire ”.

Measures and incidents on New Year's Eve 2016/17

Cologne

New surveillance cameras ( multifocal sensor systems ) were installed on Cologne's station forecourt in December 2016
Mayor Reker in front of the name of the light show at Cologne Cathedral on New Year's Eve 2016/17

On New Year's Eve in the following year, the general security precautions and the police presence in the entire inner city area were massively increased in order to prevent sexual assaults and other brutality crimes of the same kind. In the area around the cathedral were firecrackers and other fireworks prohibited. The footpaths and cycle paths of the Hohenzollern Bridge have been closed for safety reasons. The closure was a consequence of the events on New Year's Eve in Cologne the previous year, when chaotic scenes had occurred on the bridge. People had panicked and ran onto the tracks; Crimes had also been committed on the bridge. The lighting has been increased in several places; there was an interactive light show on the cathedral plate. In addition, street workers were present for a young target group and a contact point was offered especially for women in the form of a mobile advice center.

Initially, 1,500 state police officers were scheduled for the night in the city center, which is a ten-fold increase in the number of officers compared to the previous year. In addition, 600 security personnel were deployed, including private security guards. In addition, five times as many (800 officials) were deployed to federal police officers in train stations and trains in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia compared to the previous year . The number of state police officers was increased again at night, so that a total of 1700 officers were deployed in the city center. The reason given by the police was the simultaneous arrival of around 1,000 people at Cologne Central Station between 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. Similar to the previous year, the people were male and of North African origin. A police spokesman for the Federal Police said: "We had groups that were as aggressive as in 2015." According to the Cologne Police President, the young men also had an "aggressive mood", so that without the heavy police presence, serious crimes were to be expected. After ID checks, the men were only allowed to enter the celebration zone individually to prevent groups from forming. At the train station in Cologne-Deutz , 300 arriving men from the “wanted clientele” were intercepted and checked by police officers who, according to the police, came almost exclusively from the Maghreb and Arab countries. Criticism of the selection of people was countered by the fact that one knew what a " Nafri " looked like. Two weeks after New Year's Eve, the Cologne police published information from which it emerged that, unlike in the previous year and contrary to initial information, the majority of the people checked in the city center were not of North African origin, but mainly citizens of Iraq , Syria and Afghanistan .

In Cologne only about 900 evictions were issued by the Federal Police . 92 people were temporarily detained. On January 1, there were 117 complaints, 10 of them relating to sexual offenses.

While the police operation was largely assessed as prudent and expedient, there was isolated criticism, including from the party Die Linke , the SPD politician Christopher Lauer and the party leader of the Greens , Simone Peter . The term “ Nafri ” used by the police on Twitter was criticized , an internal term for young male offenders from North Africa. The designation is racist, to reject the police strategy as racial profiling . The Cologne police chief called the term a "very unhappy [e]" term, but rejected allegations of racism.

A “New Year's Eve working group” of the Cologne police investigated why around 2000 young men, mainly from Arab countries, were traveling to Cologne on New Year's Eve 2016/17, as in the previous year. The reason was not that Cologne was the closest major city, but that the city was perceived by young men in the Arab world as the “only true metropolis in Central Europe” and enjoyed a reputation as an “event” capital. When they arrived in Germany, many had already got to know them as a hub from which they were distributed to other cities. In addition, Cologne is "very interesting for this group because of its central location in Central Europe and the favorable transport connections." The fact that the city is so popular with refugees of Arab origin and asylum seekers also surprised the police. The knowledge was gained from interviews with scientists.

Hamburg

Parallel to Cologne, there was also a high number of brutality crimes and sexual assaults on women in Hamburg at the turn of 2015/2016. On New Year's Eve 2016/17, security measures were increased and 500 police officers were deployed on the Reeperbahn , the Große Freiheit , the Landungsbrücken and Jungfernstieg . According to the police, groups of young men were particularly noticeable on Jungfernstieg due to their aggressive behavior, including many people with a migration background. 100 criminal charges were filed during the night, including 14 sexual harassment charges. Of the ten suspects identified, nine were foreigners, mainly from Iraq and Syria. In addition, 75 dismissals were issued and 27 people were taken into custody.

Frankfurt am Main

On the banks of the Main in Frankfurt , where around 100,000 people celebrated New Year's Eve in previous years, only around 5,000 people were present on New Year's Eve 2016/17. A security zone was set up by the police, which was intended for about 30,000 people. In Frankfurt, like in Cologne, there were many large groups of young men on the road. Sometimes there were chaotic situations at the checkpoints and at midnight on the bridges and on the Römerberg in Frankfurt's old town . These scenarios were determined by these groups, families were not visible, and women without male accompaniment were also hardly visible.

Hanover

In Hanover , the police presence was increased by 30% compared to the previous year. In contrast to previous years, the police patrolled on New Year's Eve 2016/17, sometimes with submachine guns , body cameras and signal vests in the city ​​center and in certain places. Between 9 p.m. and 11 p.m., more people came to the city center, including many young men with a migration background. At times around 1000 people were at the station and on the forecourt. The Federal Police perceived "disrespectful and disrespectful behavior", police officers and visitors were regularly provoked. Firecrackers and rockets are said to have been thrown or shot deliberately at passers-by. Overall, there were 30 percent more calls to the operations control center in Hanover than in the previous year.

innsbruck

In Innsbruck there were at least 18 sexual assaults on women by groups of young men on New Year's Eve 2016/17. According to the Tyrolean State Criminal Police Office , sexual assaults of this kind have occurred for the first time. On the basis of statements made by the injured party, the Innsbruck police suspected that the perpetrators came from “North African or Central to South Asian regions”.

literature

  • Udo Behrendes: The Cologne New Year's Eve 2015/2016 and its consequences Perceptual perspectives , findings and instrumentalizations , in: NK Neue Kriminalpolitik 28/3 (2016), pp. 322–343.
  • Thomas Bliesener: The New Year's Eve in Cologne and the consequences - a critical look at the "foreigner crime". In: Public Safety Yearbook (2016/2017), pp. 48–57.
  • Stefanie Dürr et al .: The Cologne New Year's Eve in the media and in public. Sexual violence in the public debate , in: Communicatio Socialis 49/3 (2016), pp. 283–296.
  • Judith Froese: Avoidance of danger through typical procedures vs. Racial Profiling. The debate about the police operation in Cologne on New Year's Eve 2016/17. In: Deutsches Verwaltungsblatt Vol. 132 (2017), 5, pp. 293–295.
  • Alice Schwarzer (ed.): The shock - The New Year's Eve of Cologne. Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne 2016, ISBN 978-3-462-04999-2 . ( Excerpts from Google Books )
  • Christian Wiermer: The night that changed Germany. Background, facts and revelations about the dramatic attacks on New Year's Eve in Cologne. riva, Munich 2017, ISBN 3-7423-0189-6 .

Web links

Commons : Sexual Assaults on New Year's Eve 2015/16  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ ZEIT ONLINE: Cologne: Hardly any convictions for sexual assault on New Year's Eve . In: The time . March 11, 2019, ISSN  0044-2070 ( zeit.de [accessed November 3, 2019]).
  2. ↑ Report of the MIK NRW ( Memento from January 16, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF) - Report of the Ministry of the Interior and Municipal Affairs of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia (MIK NRW) on the attacks at Cologne Central Station at the turn of the year for the special meeting of the Interior Committee on January 11, 2016. Retrieved January 21, 2016, p. 1.
  3. ↑ Anant Agarwala: Crime: Cologne's tough fight against the "Nafri" criminals. In: Zeit Online. January 15, 2016, accessed January 2, 2017 .
  4. ↑ Report of the MIK NRW ( Memento from January 16, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF) - Report of the Ministry of the Interior and Municipal Affairs of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia (MIK NRW) on the attacks at Cologne Central Station at the turn of the year for the special meeting of the Interior Committee on January 11, 2016. Retrieved January 21, 2016, p. 1.
  5. ↑ a b Stefan Sommer: Restless New Year's Eve in Cologne. Women molested at the main train station - almost mass panic at the cathedral . In: Kölnische Rundschau (online), January 1, 2016.
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  8. ↑ a b Where was the police? In: Saxon newspaper . January 7, 2016, p. 2.
  9. ↑ Report of the MIK NRW ( Memento from January 16, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF) - Report of the Ministry of the Interior and Municipal Affairs of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia (MIK NRW) on the attacks at Cologne Central Station at the turn of the year for the special meeting of the Interior Committee on January 11, 2016. Retrieved January 21, 2016, p. 4.
  10. ↑ zeit.de January 5, 2016: Police have no knowledge of the perpetrators after attacks ( memento from January 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive ).
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  82. ↑ Focus Online, January 9, 2016: Riots on New Year's Eve in Bielefeld are more difficult than previously known
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  148. ↑ ( Open letter to Merkel: Refugees want to "protect the dignity of women." The World, January 10, 2016 Retrieved on January 10, 2016 . )
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