BERLIN — A German far-right group busted for plotting to topple the federal government have been closely armed and posed an actual risk, the federal police chief mentioned Thursday.
Those arrested on Wednesday included “a dangerous mix of people with irrational convictions, some with a lot of money and others in possession of weapons,” Holger Muench instructed the ARD broadcaster.
They had put in place “a plan that they also intended to carry out… That makes it dangerous and that is why we intervened,” he mentioned.
Weapons have been present in 50 of the places searched, Muench mentioned, together with crossbows, rifles and ammunition.
Fifty-four individuals are underneath investigation for hyperlinks to the group, which prosecutors say was planning to overthrow the German state and set up its personal authorities.
Twenty-five individuals have been arrested, together with an ex-MP, former troopers and aristocrat and businessman Prince Heinrich XIII Reuss, who was reportedly earmarked to be Germany’s new chief after the coup.
However, “We should not assume that a group with a few dozen members, maybe a hundred, is able to really challenge the state system in Germany,” Muench mentioned.
More arrests are more likely to be made, he added.
“We have identified other people whose status in relation to this group we do not yet know exactly,” he mentioned.
The group is regarded as made up of supporters of the “Citizens of the Reich” (Reichsbuerger), an ideological motion in Germany that encompasses far-right extremists, conspiracy theorists and gun fans.
The Reichsbuerger usually imagine within the continued existence of the pre-World War I German Reich, or empire, underneath a monarchy and a number of other teams have declared their very own states.
The group planning the plot had been underneath surveillance because the spring, Thomas Haldenwang, Germany’s home safety chief, instructed the RTL broadcaster.
“This is the first time a nationwide network has been set up with very concrete plans,” he added, stressing that there have been “plans to overthrow the government, plans to actually implement an overthrow.”
There are round 21,000 Reichsbuerger in Germany, he mentioned, round 10 % of whom are thought-about seemingly to make use of violence. — Agence France-Presse
