A German far-right group has launched a vigilante street patrol in a Bavarian town where four Afghan and Iranian asylum seekers allegedly attacked passers-by last weekend, local authorities said Thursday.
The mayor of Amberg, Michael Cerny, said he was "shocked" after the extremist NPD party posted photos online of four people wearing red protective vests to create "safe spaces", including outside a refugee centre.
"I can understand the insecurity seen in some of the reactions of some Ambergers, but the hatred and the threats of violence from all over the country go way too far," Cerny told the local daily Mittelbayerische Zeitung.
Police said they were investigating the reports, which also said a group calling itself "Kraut/pol" had accused town authorities in an email of failing to protect the citizens of Amberg.
The site of Saturday's violence in Amberg. Source: Mittelbayerische Zeitung
Local police had last Saturday detained four men from Afghanistan and Iran, aged 17 to 19, who had allegedly drunkenly attacked passers-by at random.
Twelve people aged 16 to 42 were beaten and suffered mostly minor injuries, and a 17-year-old was treated for head wounds in hospital.
The case revived a simmering debate over immigration, integration and crime that has flared since the mass influx of over one million asylum seekers since 2015.
Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, who hails from Bavaria and has been harshly critical of Merkel's liberal stance on immigration, quickly chimed in and called for speedy expulsions of immigrants who break the law.
The newspaper said the suspects included an Afghan man with an ongoing asylum request and three rejected asylum seekers - an Iranian who has no passport, an Afghan who is underage, and another Afghan with an ongoing appeal against his deportation order.
A spokeswoman for Angela Merkel on Wednesday condemned the assaults. Source: AAP
A spokeswoman for Merkel on Wednesday condemned the assaults in Amberg as well as a xenophobic attack by a 50-year-old unemployed German man who steered his car into groups of immigrants on New Year's Eve.
One of those attacks, in the city of Bottrop, left eight people injured, including a four-year-old Afghan boy and a 10-year-old Syrian girl.
