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Police say meeting of extremists in central Germany without incident

DPA WORLD
Published June 05,2023
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A meeting of extremists known as Reichsbürger, or Reich Citizens, in central Germany passed off without major incident, according to police.

About half of the up to 170 participants had left by Sunday afternoon, a police spokesman said on Sunday.

The police were on site on Friday for close checks after the regulatory authority had approved the event under strict conditions in close consultation with the police.

The meeting, which the scene called a "Reich congress," took place on the grounds of a horse farm near the town of Leinefelde-Worbis in the state of Thuringia.

According to an event programme circulated on Telegram, well-known right-wing extremists were also to give lectures. According to estimates from security sources, it was a "large networking meeting" of the scene of supra-regional importance.

People who deny the existence of the Federal Republic of Germany are called Reich Citizens. Among other things, they reject the democratic order in Germany.

The German domestic intelligence agency, officially the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, estimates that around 23,000 people belong to the Reich Citizens scene. In Thuringia alone there are said to be more than 1000.

In December 2022, the Federal Prosecutor's Office and the police carried out large-scale raids in Germany targeting the Reich Citizens, who are said to have planned a violent coup in Germany. There were also connections to Thuringia.