German far-right renews anti-Merkel protests

German far-right demonstrators gathered in the eastern city of Chemnitz for renewed protests against Chancellor Angela Merkel's immigration policy on Thursday, while local judicial authorities scrambled to react to a growing scandal.

As hundreds of people, some waving German flags, arrived for a march through the former communist town from 6:00 pm, there was no sign of a repeat of the violent outbreaks of anger against immigrants that followed a knife killing on Sunday.

Police said they would be backed by reinforcements from five other states and federal police, after being heavily outnumbered by thousands of neo-Nazis, football hooligans and other extremists in unrest Sunday and Monday.

The street violence was triggered by the arrest of Iraqi Yousif Ibrahim A., 22 and Syrian Alaa S., 23, who are suspected of stabbing 35-year-old carpenter Daniel H. after what police called an "altercation" at a local festival.

Mobs launched random street attacks against people whom they took to be foreigners, including an Afghan, a Syrian and a Bulgarian man.

In another violent hate crime overnight in the ex-communist east, a 20-year-old migrant was subjected to xenophobic insults and kicked and beaten with an iron chain by three men in the Baltic coast city of Wismar, police said without giving his nationality.

Images of the Chemnitz violence went around the world, but demonstrators gathered under a banner reading "the people are rising up" chanted "lying press!" on Thursday as a speaker denounced the TV footage.

The sight of protesters making the illegal Hitler salute in front of police officers had been "shocking," said UN human rights chief Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, demanding that politicians from all over Europe speak out.

Meanwhile Christoph Heubner, executive vice-president of the International Auschwitz Committee said that "Holocaust survivors are watching the attempt by far-right groups to seize power over the streets and bring hate into cities with growing concern."

Local authorities in Saxony state have been embarrassed by the far-right outbursts, facing allegations that police officers and other officials have colluded with far-right elements.

After the arrest warrant for the two stabbing suspects was posted online, prison guard Daniel Zabel told mass-market daily Bild late on Thursday that he photographed and forwarded the document to friends of Daniel H. and right-wing group Pro Chemnitz.

"I wanted the truth and only the truth to reach the public," said Zabel, 39, accusing the media of "manipulating" the truth and the authorities of "lying" to the public.

After police raided his home and he was suspended by the regional justice ministry, Zabel added, "I know that I will very likely lose my job." He faces up to five years in prison or a fine for revealing the confidential information.

Tensions risked being inflamed further by a news report that the Iraqi suspect in the murder case had, despite a lengthy criminal record, somehow avoided deportation.

The trained hairdresser arrived in Germany in 2015, the peak year of the influx that would bring over one million mostly Muslim people to the EU's biggest economy, reported mass-circulation Bild daily. Since then he had reportedly received a suspended seven-months jail term for assault and been charged with other offences, including taking illegal drugs across national borders, fraud and property damage.

Crimes by immigrants are routinely seized upon by far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD) and street movement Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the Occident (PEGIDA) who label Merkel a "traitor" for allowing them into the country. AfD leader Alexander Gauland told Die Welt daily that "migration is destroying the feeling that you can trust your neighbour."

The AfD and other anti-immigration groups have called for another major protest Saturday, with a "silent march" planned for the stabbing victim in Chemnitz, an AfD party stronghold.

The violence and heated debate on immigration have brought back to the fore what has become the most challenging political issue for Merkel, especially in the former communist east of Germany where the AfD is the number one party in some towns and regions.

Under Merkel, Germany has welcomed more than one million refugees since 2015, many of them from conflict zones in the Middle East and Africa, but her government has increasingly tightened asylum laws as conservative and far-right disquiet has grown.

After an initially jubilant welcome, the migrant influx sparked a strong backlash that saw a spate of hate crimes, swept the populist fringe party AfD into parliament and led to a coarsening of political discourse on social media and in public life.    (AFP)