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North Rhine-Westphalia Interior Minister Herbert Reul
Photo: via www.imago-images.de / imago images / Political-Moments
In the vicinity of the private home of North Rhine-Westphalia's Interior Minister Herbert Reul (CDU) in Leichlingen, there was a "spontaneous meeting" of unknown masked people.
The police announced this at the request of the German Press Agency.
Accordingly, it was a group of 20 to 50 people who moved through the streets of the 28,000-inhabitant city in the Rhenish-Bergisch district.
Some of the rioters detonated Bengalos in front of the home of the interior minister, shouted slogans and held up banners with an unknown label, the police said in the evening.
The meeting quickly dissolved.
According to information from the "Kölner Stadtanzeiger" (Cologne City Gazette), witnesses apparently observed that projectiles were also dropped at Reul's domicile.
A neighbor reported therefore from a heavily smoking object in the garden.
Reul was not at home at the time of the crime.
The police moved out in the afternoon with three hundred teams and tried to get an overview of the situation.
A police helicopter also circled over the area until late in the evening.
Witnesses were heard and statements evaluated.
The police were looking for the perpetrators of the riot, some of whom are said to have fled to a nearby forest.
A witness reported in the evening that in the city, which lies between Solingen and Leverkusen, some police vehicles were still to be seen.
The area around Reul's private house in the city was not cordoned off.
There was no visible damage to the building.
According to a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, the police were alerted by residents in the afternoon.
The police reported in the message in the evening: "The background to the meeting is still unclear, possibly the action could have been in connection with the new assembly law."
ime / dpa
