Read the video transcript here
Lateral thinkers demo last Sunday in Berlin.
This scene occurs at Alexanderplatz, which is widely commented on on social media.
A policeman lies helpless on the floor, a freelance photojournalist protects him.
The journalist, who goes by the name of "Demoticker", shares the scene on Twitter.
We can reach him in his home town of Thuringia via video call.
He wears a mask during the interview to make himself unrecognizable - a precautionary measure.
»Demo ticker«, photojournalist and eyewitness
»I make myself unrecognizable because my colleagues have already been» doped «because of such things. Which means that these people were visited at home and pictures and addresses of the people were published online. "
We recapitulate once again how it came about that journalists suddenly have to protect police officers in the German capital.
»Demo ticker«, photojournalist and eyewitness
»That was actually an act of initiative because I immediately thought to myself that this person lying on the ground just doesn't have the opportunity to defend or protect himself. And it was just in my head the thought that if I were lying there, I would also wish that people would stand around me, that people would try to defend me - and I wanted to do that too. But this angry mob, now I really call it a mob, kept beating and kicking people around in the police force. "
Our interview partner shot these scenes of arrests shortly before the escalation occurred. The situation is generally heated that day.
Despite the ban on several demonstrations by opponents of corona measures and other initiatives, thousands of people took to the streets in Berlin on Sunday. There were more than 600 arrests, the so-called lateral thinkers met the police all day long. Media representatives were also attacked. The German Union of Journalists reported that their country manager had been brutally attacked.
“Demo ticker”, photojournalist and eyewitness
“Journalists are approached very aggressively at these demos;
As soon as you wear a mask as a journalist, you are immediately referred to as a lying press.
In addition, there are spitting attacks, hits on the camera.
Hands are held in front of the camera, you are pushed around.
In some cases, free reporting is no longer possible at all, because as soon as you have a camera in your hand and wear the mask, you are actually physically approached very aggressively. "
The police were on duty with around 2,250 officers to keep the so-called lateral thinkers under control - apparently that was not enough.
The demonstrators' anger is repeatedly directed against uninvolved observers.
A development that has increased in recent years.
»Demo ticker«, photojournalist and eyewitness
»The violence came back then, I'm now talking about the middle or the end of last year, for example Leipzig, mainly about right-wing extremist groups. Since these groups had left in the course of time, the radicalization of lateral thinkers has continued to increase. "
Nevertheless, the rapporteurs should not be deterred.
“I will nevertheless continue to accompany this demonstration, because I think that there must be people who report from there, who report live from there and who report neutrally. Because we have very, very many streamers on site who are streamer activists, that's what I call them now, who stand for the lateral thinker thing and want to stream and are in some cases in possession of fake press IDs, which is also a huge problem these days. And I and my colleagues try to report as neutrally as possible and present the events on site to a larger audience. And if we stopped going, at some point nobody would really go there. "