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Police forces run across the Street of Nations in Chemnitz to stop participants in an unauthorized demonstration against the Corona measures
Photo: Jan Woitas / dpa
The police stopped protests against the corona measures in numerous Saxon locations on Monday evening. Several thousand people took part in total. According to the police, several hundred people each had gathered in Bautzen, Chemnitz and Freiberg, among other things. Around a hundred people demonstrated in Zwickau. In Zwönitz in the Ore Mountains there were around 60 people; in Dippoldiswalde, Freital, Glashütte, Heidenau, Kreischa, Königstein, Neustadt, Pirna and Sebnitz (all districts of Saxon Switzerland-Eastern Ore Mountains) between 20 and 150 people.
The police had announced a tougher pace after they had hardly taken action against the inadmissible protests in the state with the highest corona numbers in Germany in the past few weeks.
There had been sharp criticism of that.
The Corona Emergency Ordinance currently only allows rallies in Saxony with a maximum of ten participants and only at one fixed location.
The Chemnitz Police Department stated on Tuesday night that it had reported a total of 717 administrative offenses and more than a dozen criminal proceedings in several cities.
"We have to take note that the protest is increasingly charged with hatred and violence"
Saxony's Interior Minister Roland Wöller (CDU) expressed concern at RTL Direkt about the radicalization of the protests against the Corona policy: "This is a dramatic situation that has worsened again in recent weeks," he said. "We have to take note that the protest is increasingly charged with hatred and violence." He rejected allegations that the state is not doing enough against right-wing extremist structures. Since Michael Kretschmer (CDU) took over the government, the issue has been taken very seriously: "We are in the process of pushing back these structures step by step."
The Robert Koch Institute (RKI) stated the number of new infections per 100,000 inhabitants in Saxony on Monday as 1234.4.
The state parliament determined the epidemic situation in the Free State on Monday and thus created the legal basis for its own protective measures in the corona pandemic.
The police had secured the meeting with a large contingent and sealed off the parliament.
According to the police, about 50 people gathered without permission shortly after the session opened.
The meeting was dissolved and an administrative offense procedure was initiated.
By the evening, 27 people had to answer for violations of the emergency regulation.
On Friday around 30 opponents of the corona policy protested in front of the home of the Saxon Health Minister Petra Köpping (SPD), carrying torches and posters.
Protests in Thuringia and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
In
Thuringia
, there were protests against the state corona measures in almost all districts on Monday evening.
There were a total of 24 meeting places, said a police spokesman on Monday evening.
The number of participants was mostly higher than currently permitted.
Only stationary rallies with a maximum of 35 people are allowed in Thuringia.
The officials had therefore tried not to allow elevators and to find those responsible in the non-registered demos.
According to the police, the largest protests were in Erfurt with around a thousand, in Altenburg with around 800 and in Zeulenroda with 600 participants.
According to a preliminary assessment by the police, it was generally quieter than during the protests at the weekend.
In
Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
, more than 2,700 people demonstrated on Monday against what they consider to be the too strict Corona regulations.
That was almost twice as many as a week ago, as police spokesmen in Rostock and Neubrandenburg said.
There were registered demonstrations in Rostock, Greifswald and Neubrandenburg as well as an unregistered protest in Schwerin.
Thuringia’s head of the
protection of the constitution calls for harshness against corona protests
In view of the Corona protests, Thuringia's head of the protection of the constitution, Stephan Kramer, called for tougher action by the state and the judiciary.
"It's no longer about freedom of assembly and freedom of expression," he told the editorial network Germany (RND).
“It's all about intimidation and fear.
These people don't need communication, they need a clear message. «Not only politicians, but also teachers, doctors and scientists are threatened.
"You can't put all of them under police protection," said Kramer.
"We have to take action."
aar / dpa