Germany, extreme right emergency. Citizens of the "Reich" would be building an army

A far-right movement in Germany claims that its supporters are citizens of Prussia. They would be arming themselves and represent a growing threat to security, according to a dossier from the country's intelligence services. The members of the movement call themselves Reichsbuerger ("citizens of the Reich") and reject the legitimacy of the Federal Republic of Germany. Instead of the modern German state, which emerged in 1990 from the union of East and West Germany, the Reichsbuergers swear allegiance to the Deutsches Reich (German Reich), the German Nazi state that existed between 1933 and 1945. They also claim that The Deutsches Reich, Prussia, continues to exist in its pre-1945 state and is still ruled by a provisional government in exile.
The followers of the Reichsbuerger also contacted the foreign embassies present in Berlin to ask to be recognized as citizens of the Third Reich. In addition, some Reichsbuerger associations issue Deutsches Reich identity cards and Deutsches Reich car plates. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), Germany's leading internal security agency, said the Reichsbuerger movement is growing and must be seen as a potential security threat. According to the recent BfV report, the Reichsbuerger movement has grown by more than 65 percent since 2016 and currently has around 20.000 militants.
In its report, the BfV notes that the growing numbers of Reichsbuerger adherents can be partly attributed to the increased attention that the German authorities have given to far-right organizations. The agency also claims that only about five percent of adherents could be described as extremist and violent. However, the violent Reichsbuergers rose from 500 in 2016 to 900 in 2017, an increase of 80% in one year, according to the report. In addition, the BfV says, many key members of the Reichsbuerger movement are said to have close links with far-right German criminal networks, whose members include former and current supporters of the National Socialist Underground (NSU). Earlier this month, several NSU members were found guilty of participating in 10 murders of immigrants between 2000 and 2007. The BfV report says Reichsbuergers increasingly consider NSU violent acts as examples. to follow, and that they are systematically attempting - to obtain licenses for the possession of weapons. In a report released earlier this year, the BfV also warned that the Reichsbuerger movement would be trying to build an army.

 

 

Germany, extreme right emergency. Citizens of the "Reich" would be building an army

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