Germany's toughest opponent: extremists

Andy Eckardt Producer

MAINZ , Germany — As teams such as Ghana and Trinidad and Tobago have arrived in Germany for this year’s World Cup they have been greeted to a hero's welcome from their local hosts.

Large delegations, complete with their local hosts waving national flags, have greeted the foreign teams. In the northern city of Celle, the Angola team was even presented with modern technical equipment for a new hospital by their German hosts.

Some welcomes for international guests, however, have not been so warm.

Over the last several months the motto of the prestigious sports tournament, "A Time To Make Friends,” has been heavily tarnished by a number of neo-Nazi attacks on foreigners, particularly those of color. The incidents have left German officials scrambling to reassure visitors that the 32-nation soccer tournament, which kicks off on June 9, will not be marred by violence. 

Recent attacks
The string of recent attacks, coupled with a recent study suggesting there is an uptick in the number of neo-Nazis in Germany, has left many foreigners worried.

On May 26, three dark-skinned men from Mozambique and Cuba were beaten by eight assailants, ages 19 to 29, in the eastern German city of Weimar. That attack came just weeks after an Ethiopian-born man was brutally clubbed into a coma by two neo-Nazi thugs in Potsdam, the capital of Brandenburg state (a part of the former East Germany which surrounds Berlin). And in another incident, a Kurdish-born German politician was attacked in his district of Berlin-Lichtenberg. Officials believe that all attacks were racially motivated.

The attacks seemed to confirm a controversial comment made by a former government spokesman about "no-go-zones,” which he said exist in some rural areas and districts of eastern German cities.

"There are small and middle-sized towns in Brandenburg and elsewhere where I would not advise anyone who has a different skin color to go. He might not leave alive," Uwe-Karsten Heye, who now heads an anti-racist organization, told a German newspaper.

Adding to fears, a recent report from Germany's Bfv domestic intelligence agency says that the number of neo-Nazis in Germany rose to 4,100 last year from 3,800 in 2004. At the same time, the number of extremists ready to engage in violence increased by 400 to 10,400, according to the report.

Simultaneously, the number of skinhead groups rose to 142 from 106 and skinhead concerts by 40 to 192. (Skinheads are often, though not always, associated across much of Europe with extreme-right organizations.) However, the overall figure of right-wing extremists dropped from some 40,700 in the previous year to around 39,000 in a nation of approximately 82 million people, according to the same report.

Social and economic roots
Since German reunification in 1990, the country has struggled with high levels of unemployment and stagnating growth. Germans in many eastern regions, where unemployment was almost non-existent under the former communist regime, have become frustrated with their economic and social situation.

In particular, while large eastern cities such as Dresden, Leipzig and Weimar have flourished with the help of western investment in the past decade — re-constructing their historic centers and benefitting from other economic stimulus — many small towns in rural eastern areas and large city suburbs are suffering distinctly lower levels of prosperity.

"We clearly admit that we have a huge problem," said Matthias Platzeck, the governor of Brandenburg in a recent talk show discussion on public television.

Platzeck sees communist history as one of the causes for right-wing extremism and violence in the eastern states.

"Eastern Germans have only very limited experience with other cultures because this had not been practiced in the past," he said. During its 40-year history, East Germany welcomed very few foreign workers to the country and travel was severely limited for its citizens, thus limiting citizens' horizons.

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