Rick Halperin
Thu, 4 Sep 2008 21:23:29 -0500 (Central Daylight Time)
Sept. 4 GERMANY: DEATH PENALTY CAMPAIGN----Neo-Nazis Exploit Public Anger over Girl's Murder The murder of an eight-year-old girl in Germany has prompted neo-Nazis to campaign for the death penalty with torch-lit vigils that politicians are calling a blatant attempt to capitalize on public anger. Analysts say it's a strategy that has worked in the past for Germany's increasingly active far-right scene. German neo-Nazis have seized on the recent murder of an 8 year-old-girl in the eastern city of Leipzig to drum up support for themselves by organizing protest marches demanding the death penalty for child abusers. Leipzig's mayor, police and local politicians have accused the National Democratic Party (NPD) and other far-right organizations of blatantly seeking to exploit public anger at the child's murder. Experts on Germany's far-right scene say the NPD is a past master at exploiting emotive public issues such as child abuse, drugs, immigration and unemployment. They say it's a strategy that has proved successful in eastern Germany, where unemployment and social upheaval since unification in 1990 have left many people disenchanted with the mainstream parties and with politics in general. "The NPD is trying to gain support by pretending to be a normal party and milking the frustration and fear of the people of Leipzig," Friedemann Bringt, project manager at Kulturbro Sachsen, a government-funded consultancy on combating racism, told SPIEGEL ONLINE. "We're concerned that this strategy may pay off for them." Some 280 far-right activists, most of them clad in black, gathered on Monday evening carrying banners that read "Death Penalty Instead of Therapy" and "National Socialism Now!" They were joined by a number of senior NPD members including deputy leader Holger Apfel. On the previous Monday around 300 neo-Nazis had joined a vigil organized by a local parents' group to mourn Michelle, whose body was found in a pond on Aug. 21, 4 days after she went missing on her way home from school. Police say she was murdered and the killer is still at large. 'Despicable Behavior' "The far-right extremists are now unashamedly showing their true, inhuman face," Leipzig's Mayor Burkhard Jung said in a statement. They're trying to make political capital from this terrible deed, without a shred of decency and without showing any respect for the dignity of the murdered girl Michelle or the express wishes of her parents. This behavior is despicable." The NPD's regional organization for the state of Saxony dismissed the criticism as "superficial." "If more and more children are disappearing in broad daylight, if they're simply not coming home from school or from the playground, it's a sign that the system has simply failed," it said in a statement on its Web site. "Our children are the future of our people." The NPD said members of the far right had joined the search for Michelle in the days after she disappeared and had distributed more than 10,000 leaflets bearing her photo. "We won't let anyone ban us from taking to the streets. We will carry on demonstrating for as long as we see fit," the party said. Germany's domestic intelligence agency, the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, describes the NPD as "racist, anti-Semitic and revisionist" and says its stated beliefs have marked similarities with Nazi ideology. Yet it's a legitimate political party, receives public funding and has gained in support since an attempt by the government and parliament to outlaw it failed in 2003 due to a legal bungle. The party, which states that an "African, Asian or Oriental" can never become German, got elected to the Saxony state parliament with a vote of 9.2 % in 2004 after successfully positioning itself as a protest party against deep welfare cuts imposed by the government of former Chancellor Gerhard Schrder. It is also represented in the state parliament of another eastern German state, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. Growing Influence The NPD is riven by in-fighting between hard-line neo-Nazis on the one hand and moderates who want to broaden its appeal to mainstream voters. Its chairman Udo Voigt is in legal trouble for making a racist remark and one of its top members faces court action for recently breaking a tight law prohibiting the display of Nazi symbols. However, the party did well in local elections in June 2008 and is widely expected to get the 5 % support needed to retain its parliamentary presence in the next Saxony election in 2009. "The NPD is benefiting from an environment in which people have become alienated from the established political parties and from politics itself," Roland Roth, an expert on the far-right at Magdeburg University, told SPIEGEL ONLINE. "The share of people politically alienated in this way has increased sharply in eastern Germany over the last decade. In that sense the type of political opportunism the NPD is now engaging in has some chance of success. "The party has always seized on emotive issues, be it drug abuse or pedophiles. It always tries to present itself as the party of law and order to boost its support in the population." The increase in far-right support in eastern Germany, especially among young men with few job prospects, has been accompanied by racist violence. The region has a higher incidence of racist assaults per capita than in western Germany. Analysts say the education system in communist East Germany is partly to blame because it didn't instill a sense of national responsibility for the crimes of the Nazis, unlike schools in the west. As a result, the far-right carries less of a stigma in the east. "In some areas the NPD has a better infrastructure than the big parties in terms of local organizations and youth clubs," said Roth. "It has managed to appeal to young people more than the other parties. Its local clubs are often run by respected people such as local businessmen and trades people." Bringt, whose organization advises parents, schools and local authorities on how to deal with neo-Nazis, is fighting an uphill battle. "In the local elections in June the NPD showed more presence than any other party, they put up more placards and had campaign stands everywhere." "I'm worried that many people here lack the political education to be able to recognize the NPD for what it really represents. It has become tactically cleverer and more modern. You even get far-right hip-hop and rap bands these days." (source: Spiegel) LATVIA: Justice minister rethinks death penalty Berzins said that, "as a father," he had considered reinstating the death penalty (Photo Courtesy of the Ministry of Justice)RIGA The Latvian Justice Minister has called into question the "usefulness" of abolishing the death penalty. In an interview with Latvian Public Radio on Thursday, Justice Minister Gaidis Berzins said that "as a father" he had considered the possibility of renewing the death penalty for perpetrators of violent crimes against children. The minister also said, however, that he knew it would be impossible to follow through with the motion because of Latvia's obligations in the European Union. "I understand that it is the issue related with death penalty and our obligations concerning accession to the European Union, but as a father I would like to say that such people have no place in the society," he said. Berzins said it would not be useful to open a debate on the topic because of the countrys international obligations. The minister made the comments when asked about a recent case in which a father brutally murdered his 11-year-old daughter. Daina, a student of the BauskaChristianElementary School, was found in her bed with her throat slashed on the morning of Sept. 27. Her father, Ivars Grantins, confessed to committing the crime 3 days later. Investigators have announced that they would request psychiatric tests for Grantins, who has already been tried twice for sex crimes and once for physical assault. Police are currently searching for Dainas mother, who reportedly left the country to find work after losing a custody battle for the girl. The Baltic News Service reported that a criminal investigation has been launched over her disappearance. Latvia effectively abolished capital punishment in 1996 nobody has been given the death penalty and no executions have taken place in the country since that time. Under the Penal Law, however, the capital punishment can still be given in wartime, and even then criminals can only be sentenced to execution by shooting only for aggravated murder. (source: Baltic Times) CHINA: Bird's Nest designer takes up cause of man on China's death row----Tania Branigan reports on a murder trial that has prompted widespread sympathy and a debate about the police's treatment of suspectsTania Branigan guardian. When Yang Jia burst into a police station in Shanghai and stabbed 6 officers to death, the penalty was predictable. He was given the death sentence. But few would have expected the public reaction to his case, which has been of widespread sympathy and has sparked debate about the police's treatment of suspects in what has become a Chinese cause celebre. Now a prominent intellectual has asked the supreme court to intervene and order a public retrial. The artist Ai Weiwei, who designed the Olympic Bird's Nest stadium, has written that the case's impact is so great that an open hearing is needed to demonstrate the country's commitment to judicial reform. A closed court in Shanghai found Yang guilty of premeditated murder earlier this week. According to the official media, the unemployed 28-year-old from Beijing attacked the station on July 1. He threw Molotov cocktails at the building and injured the security guard before bursting inside where he slashed at officers, killing 6 and wounding 4 more. But his case caught the public imagination following claims that he was seeking revenge for earlier mistreatment by officers. Thousands of messages supporting Yang - many removed by censors - appeared on blogs and bulletin boards. Some have even described him as a hero, though more have suggested his case raises alarming questions about the police treatment of suspects and the judicial process. Police said at a press conference that Yang, from Beijing, was angry because officers at the station in Zhabei district detained him last year for allegedly stealing a bicycle that he had in fact rented. He later demanded around 10,000 yuan (800) in compensation for "mental anguish". The Guangdong-based Southern Weekend newspaper reported that Yang had claimed he was beaten during the interrogation, although the police denied it. The supreme people's court now reviews all death sentences under "kill fewer, kill carefully" reforms introduced 2 years ago. But in his letter, Ai argued that a full retrial is needed, arguing the original investigation and hearing had been handled improperly. "Since this case has generated enormous social impact, it should not be ignored ... To go through a public and transparent judicial procedures is to safeguard the constitution as well as test China's determination and power of its judicial reform." Yang's relatives now fear that he may lose his chance to appeal. Xiong Liesuo, a Beijing lawyer hired by Yang's father, told the Guardian that the court refused him access to the defendant, saying Yang had already accepted a lawyer arranged by his mother. The couple divorced some years ago. But Yang's mother has been uncontactable since she was questioned by Beijing police following the Shanghai attack. Prior to her disappearance she apparently signed a document authorising another lawyer, Xie Youming, to act for her son. He has not replied to Xiong's messages and could not be contacted. "According to Chinese law we need to confirm the appeal with [Yang] himself, but when we went to the police station they gave us a lot of reasons to stop us meeting him," Xiong said. "[Another] reason they gave is that we don't have the judgement, which the court told us was already given to Yang Jia's mother. But we all know his mother has been out of contact for a while and when we asked how to contact his mother the court did not answer." (source: The Guardian)