It's a shock wave in Germany. The images of several hundred protesters, forcing a police blockade to try to enter the Reichstag Palace in Berlin, have marked the spirits. The building accommodates members of the Bundestag. Several German leaders denounced Sunday an "attack on democracy" with this new step in the radicalization of the movement.
This incident was the culmination of an "anti-masks" demonstration that brought together nearly 40,000 people protesting against restrictions linked to the Covid-19 pandemic and resulted in around 300 arrests during clashes with the police.
"Extreme right-wing extremes"
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier spoke out against an "unbearable attack on the heart of our democracy".
He denounced “extreme right-wing extremes” as well as the German “Reich flags” in black, white and red colors brandished by demonstrators in memory of the Empire which disappeared in 1919 after the First World War. "We will never accept this", added the president considered as the moral guarantee of the country.
The Minister of Justice, Christina Lambrecht, called on her to "defend herself against these enemies of our democracy", while a debate is launched on the advisability of continuing to authorize this type of demonstrations. "The unbearable image of neo-Nazis in front of the Reichstag [...] cannot be repeated," she told regional press group Funke, while her colleague from the Interior Horst Seehofer spoke of a slippage " unacceptable ”aimed at the“ symbolic center of our democracy ”.
A handful of officers block the crowd.
Protesters were narrowly prevented from entering the Reichstag compound on Saturday evening by the police, who used sprays to disperse the crowd and arrested several people.
The police seemed overwhelmed for a moment, with only a handful of officers attempting to block the crowd. Some were also surprised by the numerical weakness of the police.
The organizer of the demonstration, Michael Ballweg, who declares himself a “non-conformist” and without a political label, has distanced himself: the Reichstag demonstrators “have nothing to do with our movement”, according to Der Spiegel.
A building burned down by the Nazis in 1933
The Reichstag, where German deputies meet in plenary session, has a strong symbolic role in Germany. The building and its famous dome were set on fire in 1933 by the Nazis, in an act seen as intended to bring to its knees what remained of German democracy from the interwar period.
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The municipality of Berlin had tried to ban the gathering on Saturday, arguing that it was impossible to enforce safety distances and barrier gestures, given the number of people announced and their determination. But justice, seized by the organizers, finally authorized the demonstration.
The people arrested were in front of the Reichstag but also the Russian embassy, not far from there in the city center, where the protesters threw bottles and stones at the police.
Two days after the announcement of new restrictions
The demonstration in Berlin took place two days after Angela Merkel's government announced further restrictions in the face of the observed spike in infections.
The crowd was as often in this type of motley gathering composed of anti-vaccine activists, conspirators, citizens genuinely concerned about the restrictions linked to the pandemic but also, and increasingly according to the authorities, of far-right sympathizers. .
"Stop the brown virus"
"To see flags of the Empire in front of Parliament is a shame," tweeted Foreign Minister Heiko Maas. “We must stop the brown virus! Headline Sunday Bild, Germany's most widely read newspaper.
Kommentar - Stoppt das braune Virus! https://t.co/KxH16pW4YC
- BILD (@BILD) August 30, 2020If the right to protest is to be defended, "no one should go so far as to parade behind right-wing extremists," he added.
Among the demonstrators arrested in front of the Russian embassy was one of the figures of the “anti-masks” movement in Germany, Attila Hildmann, who became famous as a vegan cook and now a self-proclaimed member of the “ultra-right”.