Scattered clashes broke out in several German cities on Saturday after tens of thousands of young people peacefully took to the streets to demand better schools, relief from rising living costs and greater social justice.
Authorities reported injured officers in Frankfurt, burning barricades in Hamburg and attacks with bottles and fireworks in Berlin. Isolated skirmishes with police broke out as evening fell following afternoon marches, prompting officers to deploy water cannon in several cities.
The protests were called by the "Gen Z regelt" (Gen Z Takes Charge) youth initiative, which had mobilized supporters in more than 30 cities across Germany.
The group has a range of demands, with different issues often taking centre stage at individual marches. Supporters are calling for more funding for schools, addiction treatment and psychotherapy, stronger action on climate change, and an end to plans for compulsory military service.
Weeks of large-scale youth-led protests in France and other European countries had drawn attention to the demonstrations in Germany. Despite strong interest on social media and widespread coverage in the media, turnout was more modest than some had anticipated.
Still, the organizers hailed the protests as a success, reporting more than 100,000 participants nationwide at demonstrations held in major cities as well as smaller centres such as Erfurt, Münster, Nuremberg and Karlsruhe.
"Today, 100,000 people showed what they are taking to the streets for," said Amadeo, a spokesman for the initiative who asked to be identified only by his first name.
He said the group planned to mobilize young people again in three weeks. "For us, this is just the first step. We want to take part in the Europe-wide protests on November 20," he told dpa.
Nationwide police figures were not immediately available, although individual cities had released their own tallies.
Germany's police union said the main demonstrations had been largely peaceful, with isolated incidents breaking out only after the events had ended.
"The Gen Z protests turned out to be very peaceful," Andreas Rosskopf, the union's federal police representative, told the Rheinische Post newspaper.
He blamed the subsequent incidents on groups of masked and radical left-wing activists and said police had intervened where necessary, using water cannon and pepper spray. Officers remained on alert for further trouble overnight, although no major property damage had been reported.
Referring to the incidents after the demonstrations, Amadeo said: "What happened after the rallies ended was beyond our control."
In Frankfurt, where police said some 8,000 people turned out, several police officers were injured when demonstrators threw firecrackers at them, according to Hesse state Interior Minister Roman Poseck. Police deployed water cannon and broke up the demonstration after repeated attacks with stones and firecrackers.
In Bremen, officers were punched and kicked in isolated incidents, while at least one rubbish container was set on fire. "We can no longer speak of an entirely peaceful demonstration," a police spokesman in the northern city said. Some 2,800 people were estimated to have participated there.
In Berlin, scattered incidents were reported during an evening march in the city centre, with police saying eggs, bottles and firecrackers were thrown near the popular Hackesche Höfe complex.
Police said the evening march was organized by groups on the political left. Thousands had earlier gathered peacefully at the Brandenburg Gate for the initiative's main demonstration in the capital.
Meanwhile, in Hamburg, a largely peaceful afternoon demonstration that drew around 6,700 people was followed by scuffles near the city's main railway station as evening fell.
People dressed in black, some with their faces covered, set off fireworks, tore down plastic construction barriers and set them on fire. Police used water cannon to extinguish the flames and pepper spray to disperse the crowd before officially ending the demonstration.
In Cologne, police cancelled a planned march after some participants covered their faces and set off pyrotechnics. German law generally prohibits demonstrators from covering their faces to conceal their identities, although specific rules and enforcement vary.
Protesters carried placards with slogans including "Our future is not for sale," "System change, not climate change," "Education, not bombs" and "Eat the rich." Many signs also expressed anger at German Chancellor Friedrich Merz.
The "Gen Z regelt" organizers had explicitly called for peaceful demonstrations and rejected all forms of violence. On its website, the initiative said extremist groups and symbols hostile to Germany's constitutional order were not welcome at its protests.
Its organizing team was directly responsible for demonstrations in Berlin, Cologne, Frankfurt and Munich. It promoted events in other cities but said it was not responsible for their content or organization.
Ahead of Saturday's protests, federal security authorities said they had no specific additional intelligence indicating calls for violence or planned riots.
However, a spokeswoman for the Interior Ministry said parts of the far-left extremist scene and some groups associated with foreign-related extremism had responded to the protest calls.
Representatives of "Gen Z regelt" criticized the strong focus on the potential for violence rather than their political demands.
"That just shows that our point about not being taken seriously and not being heard is true. Because nobody wants to engage with us on the issues; instead, violence is always the only topic on the agenda," one organizer said.
