A 41-year-old SPD European Parliamentarian Matthias Ecke was brutally attacked in Dresden, leading to serious injuries. Following the assault, a 17-year-old teenager confessed to the police that he had been one of the attackers. The group of four men also targeted a 28-year-old who was putting up Green Party campaign posters, assaulting him as well. The teenager, who had no prior criminal record, turned himself in accompanied by his mother. The motives behind the attacks on Ecke and the Green Party campaign worker remain unclear, and an investigation is ongoing.
Ecke, who is the top candidate for the European Parliament election in Saxony, has been hospitalized since the attack and will require surgery. The SPD in Saxony anticipates that he will continue his campaign, although they emphasized that the focus is on his recovery rather than his political activities. The four attackers are estimated to be between 17 to 20 years old, all dressed in dark clothing. A witness has associated them with the far-right spectrum. The 17-year-old who surrendered had not been on the police’s radar before and is not expected to flee. The remaining three suspects are still at large.
Saxony’s Interior Minister Armin Schuster vowed to continue the meticulous investigation and urged the other perpetrators to turn themselves in. The violent assault on election campaigners and politicians, as well as the foundations of democracy and free elections, will not be tolerated, he asserted. The attack sparked widespread dismay across party lines, prompting President Frank-Walter Steinmeier to call on all individuals to engage in political dialogue peacefully and respectfully. Two coalitions organized demonstrations in Berlin and Dresden under the theme “Violence has no place in our democracy!” Federal and state representatives plan to discuss potential consequences of the violence on Tuesday.
Furthermore, attacks on politicians from other parties have been reported. An AfD state parliamentarian in Lower Saxony was assaulted at an information stand on Saturday morning. In Dresden, two 23-year-old women and a 28-year-old man vandalized an information stand of the same party, damaging posters, stands, and a table. The group of 20 teenagers were caught by the police defacing campaign posters of various parties in Dresden, demonstrating a trend of violence targeting politicians in the lead-up to the local and European elections on June 9th even beyond party lines.
The recent wave of assaults is part of a nationwide trend of attacks on party members ahead of the elections. Representatives from various parties have condemned the violence, emphasizing the need for a safe and respectful political environment free of aggression. Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Green Party Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck, and Justice Minister Marco Buschmann all decried the attacks as a threat to democracy. Calls for stricter punishments for perpetrators and united action have emerged from politicians across the spectrum. The urgency to protect politically engaged individuals and ensure a civil society has been underscored by these incidents.
