Germany

08 Dec 2022; MEMO: A presenter of a children's television show in Germany has been fired for attending a peaceful demonstration against the Israeli Occupation in the West Bank, in the latest case of German authorities' and media's suppression of pro-Palestinian views.

BERLIN, Dec 8 (Reuters) - German police plan further arrests as they investigate a far-right group that prosecutors say was preparing to overthrow the state and install a former member of a German royal family as national leader.

Investigators have said the group, many of whom were members of the Reichsbuerger (Citizens of the Reich) movement, planned to install aristocrat Heinrich XIII Prinz Reuss as leader of a new state and found evidence that some members planned to storm the Bundestag and arrest lawmakers.

BERLIN (AP) — German officials say they expect more people to be detained in connection with an alleged far-right plan to topple the government that saw 25 people rounded up Wednesday, including a self-styled prince, a retired paratrooper and a judge.

The plot was allegedly hatched by people linked to the so-called Reich Citizens movement, which rejects Germany’s postwar constitution and the legitimacy of the government.

07 Dec 2022; MEMO: Germany has arrested 25 suspected far-right members of a group planning to overthrow the government, using arms to storm the lower house of Parliament.

Some 3,000 officers raided 130 sites across the country and arrested 22 members of the Reich Citizens on suspicion of membership in a terror organisation.

The group is said to want a new state modelled on Germany as it was in 1871, using military means and violence against state representatives.

BERLIN, December 7. /TASS/: The Minsk accords were signed in order to "give Ukraine time" to make the country stronger, ex-German Chancellor Angela Merkel (in office from 2005 to 2021) said in an interview with the Zeit newspaper published on Wednesday.

"The 2014 Minsk agreement was an attempt to give time to Ukraine. It also used this time to become stronger as can be seen today. The Ukraine of 2014-2015 is not the modern Ukraine," the politician said.

BERLIN, December 7. /TASS/: The Minsk accords were signed in order to "give Ukraine time" to make the country stronger, ex-German Chancellor Angela Merkel (in office from 2005 to 2021) said in an interview with the Zeit newspaper published on Wednesday.

"The 2014 Minsk agreement was an attempt to give time to Ukraine. It also used this time to become stronger as can be seen today. The Ukraine of 2014-2015 is not the modern Ukraine," the politician said.

BERLIN, Dec 7 (Reuters) - Germany on Wednesday detained 25 members and supporters of a far-right group that the prosecutor's office said was preparing a violent overthrow of the state to install as national leader a prince who had sought support from Russia.

Prosecutors said the group was inspired by the deep state conspiracy theories of Germany's Reichsbuerger and QAnon, whose advocates were among those arrested after the storming of the U.S. Capitol in January 2021.

BERLIN (AP) — Thousands of police officers carried out raids across much of Germany on Wednesday against suspected far-right extremists who allegedly sought to overthrow the government in an armed coup. Officials said 25 people were detained.

Federal prosecutors said some 3,000 officers conducted searches at 130 sites in 11 of Germany’s 16 states. While police raids against the far right are not uncommonin the country — still sensitive to its grim Nazi past — the scale of the operation was unusual.

BERLIN, Dec 5 (Reuters) - German Chancellor Olaf Scholz warned against creating a new Cold War by dividing the world into blocs and called for every effort to be made to build new partnerships, writing in an opinion piece for Foreign Affairs magazine published online on Monday.

The West must stand up for democratic values and protect open societies, "but we must also avoid the temptation to once again divide the world into blocs," wrote Scholz in the piece.

FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) — Oil prices rose Monday as the first strong measures to limit Russia’s oil profits over the war in Ukraine took effect, bringing with them uncertainty about how much crude could be lost to the global economy through the new sanctions or Russian retaliation.