German court: Informants handler must stay secret
Germany s intelligence agencies face scrutiny from lawmakers over the deadly Christmas market terror attack in 2016. However, the country s top court refused to let lawmakers quiz an informants supervisor.
Opposition parties would not be allowed to question an intelligence officer over the 2016 Breitscheid Square terror attack, Germany s BVG constitutional court announced on Wednesday. The judges decided to protect the identity of the officer, who had been in charge of coordinating informants close to the attacker.
Eleven Christmas marketgoers were killed when Islamist Anis Amri drove a hijacked truck amokafter killing its driver. Italian police later shot Amri dead.
29 Jan 2021
Germany’s official parliamentary opposition party, the populist Alternative for Germany (AfD), faces possible observation by the security services just eight months before the country’s national election.
The Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, could classify part of the AfD as right-wing extremist, opening the party up to spying by the bureau.
Meanwhile, the party has filed a lawsuit against the police ahead of the looming decision on whether or not the government will consider elements of the AfD radical enough to justify it being under observation, Radio Télévision Suisse reports.
Germany Expected to Put Right-Wing AfD Under Surveillance for Violating Constitution
Rob Schmitz, NPR, January 22, 2021
Germany’s Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, is constantly on the lookout for potential threats to Germany’s democratic constitutional system, and it has wide-ranging powers when it finds them.
“This agency has the power and not only to do surveillance on fringe groups, domestic terrorist threats, but also to keep an eye on any political institution, like a political party,” said Melanie Amann of the German newsmagazine
Der Spiegel and the author of a book about the Alternative for Germany, or AfD.
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When a German teenager named Setti Pfeiffer begins her day in Israel helping severely disabled children, she often thinks of her great-grandfathers.
Almost eight decades ago, Pfeiffer’s maternal great-grandfather Herman Bernhardt helped build the Auschwitz death camp. And while she doesn’t know as much about her great-grandfather on her father’s side, the 18-year old believes that he was involved in war crimes.
“He volunteered to go to the SS and he was part of a mission in which he expelled Jews and Poles from their homes so Germans could settle there. He was involved in “killing and raping,” she said during a recent telephone interview.