The constitutional court raises AfD application to the first name of knife suspects!

The constitutional court raises AfD application to the first name of knife suspects!

Berlin, Deutschland - The dispute over the publication of first names of suspect knife attackers in Berlin takes a new turn. The Berlin Constitutional Court has decided that an application from the AfD to mention the 20 most common first names of German suspects in knife attacks was rejected as incorrect. With a narrow majority of five to four votes, the judges rejected the argumentation of the Berlin Senate, which had referred to the risk of identifying individuals. In the justification of the Constitutional Court, it is pointed out that this risk is not plausible, since the required names were only a small part of the almost 1,200 suspects in knife crimes that were registered in 2023. This decision now obliges the Senate to newly decide on the AfD's request.

The Berlin Senate had rejected the request in advance because there was fear that the naming of the first names could lead to discrimination. However, this concern was not cited during the procedure and was therefore unable to incorporate into the decision. After the judgment, AfD MP Marc Vallendar expressed himself pessimistically about government policy and described the judgment as "slap in the face" for the ruling mayor Wegner, while he still announced that he would submit a new application to disclose the first names.

background to knife attacks in Berlin

The connection between the increasing crime and the German first names has been a political issue for a long time. A total of 3,482 knife attacks were registered in Berlin in 2023. In comparison, there were 3,412 attacks in 2022, which is a slight decrease of 2 %. Over the years, the discussion about the causes of these acts of violence has become more intensive, especially with regard to the migration background of many suspects. According to official statistics, 58.1 % of the suspects had no German citizenship last year.

AfD parliamentary group and other political actors attribute the growing number of knife attacks in Germany to migration policy. Martin Hess, AfD MP, noted in an current hour that someone in Germany is threatened, injured or killed with a knife every 18 minutes. The initiatives of the AfD to clarify the perpetrators and the desire for specific data on their background are part of their political agenda and reflect a deeper concern about security.

political reactions

In the Bundestag, these claims were sharply criticized by representatives of other parties. Rasha Nasr from the SPD warned of the instrumentalization of knife crime for political purposes and described the AfD as the "intellectual arsonist". At the same time, politicians like Marc Henrichmann from the CDU/CSU illustrated the urgency to treat knife attacks as a serious security problem, and announced that they initiate corresponding legal changes in order to punish these attacks harder.