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Federal police conduct ‘largest ever’ nationwide raid against human trafficking

German federal police launched a crackdown in 12 federal states on human trafficking and organized crime on Wednesday morning.

Published: 18 April 2018 09:58 CEST
Federal police conduct ‘largest ever’ nationwide raid against human trafficking
Police raiding a house in Bonn on Wednesday. Photo: DPA

The coordinated raids, which several officials said was the biggest in the decades-long history of the force, are targeting human traffickers and criminals involved in forced prostitution.

More than 1,500 police officers have been deployed nationwide, including Germany’s GSG9 elite SWAT teams.

Over 60 residential and business premises have been searched.

The federal police in North Rhine-Westphalia reported that numerous arrest warrants have been issued and several people have already been arrested, among them a 59-year-old Thai woman and resident in Siegen. “But there will be more (arrests),” a spokesman said.

The raids are primarily aimed at a group of around 15 to 20 people of German and Thai nationality. The woman arrested is suspected of being a leader of the gang.

Among other things, the gang has been accused of human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation and the exploitation of prostitutes. The alleged perpetrators are suspected of smuggling several hundred people from Thailand to Germany and forcing them into prostitution.

The raids, which are also being conducted in brothels and massage studios, are expected to continue throughout the day on Wednesday.

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CRIME

Germany arrests Syrian man accused of plotting to kill soldiers

German authorities said Friday they had arrested a 27-year-old Syrian man who allegedly planned an Islamist attack on army soldiers using two machetes in Bavaria.

Published: 13 September 2024 11:17 CEST
Germany arrests Syrian man accused of plotting to kill soldiers

The suspect, an “alleged follower of a radical Islamic ideology”, was arrested on Thursday on charges of planning “a serious act of violence endangering the state”.

The man had acquired two heavy knives “around 40 centimetres (more than one foot) in length” in recent days, prosecutors in Munich said.

He planned to “attack Bundeswehr soldiers” in the city of Hof in northern Bavaria during their lunch break, aiming “to kill as many of them as possible”, prosecutors said.

“The accused wanted to attract attention and create a feeling of insecurity among the population,” they said.

German security services have been on high alert over the threat of Islamist attacks, in particular since the Gaza war erupted on October 7th with the Hamas attacks on Israel.

Police shot dead a man in Munich this month after he opened fire on officers in what was being treated as a suspected “terrorist attack” on the Israeli consulate in Munich.

The shootout fell on the anniversary of the kidnap and killing of Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympic Games by Palestinian militants.

The 18-year-old suspect had previously been investigated by authorities in his home country Austria on suspicion of links to terrorism but the case had been dropped.

The incident capped a string of attacks in Germany, which have stirred a sense of insecurity in Germany and fed a bitter debate of immigration.

Three people were killed last month in a suspected Islamist stabbing at a festival in the western city of Solingen.

READ ALSO: ‘Ban asylum seekers’ – How Germany is reacting to Solingen attack

The suspect in the attack, which was claimed by the Islamic State group, was a Syrian man who had been slated for deportation from Germany.

A federal interior ministry spokesman said if an Islamist motive was confirmed in the latest foiled attack, it would be “further evidence of the high threat posed by Islamist terrorism in Germany, which was recently demonstrated by the serious crimes in Mannheim and the attack in Solingen, but also by acts that were fortunately prevented by the timely intervention of the security authorities”.

The Solingen stabbing followed a knife attack in the city of Mannheim in May, which left a policeman dead, and which had also been linked to Islamism by officials.

Germany has responded to the attacks by taking steps to tighten immigration controls and knife laws.

READ ALSO: Debt, migration and the far-right – the big challenges facing Germany this autumn

The government has announced new checks along all of its borders and promised to speed up deportations of migrants who have no right to stay in Germany.

The number of people considered Islamist extremists in Germany fell slightly from 27,480 in 2022 to 27,200 last year, according to a report from the federal domestic intelligence agency.

But Interior Minister Nancy Faeser warned in August that “the threat posed by Islamist terrorism remains high”.

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