In Baden-Württemberg, a girl dies after a knife attack, a refugee is suspected. The AfD exploited the act immediately.
Flowers and candles commemorate the two girls who were attacked at the crime scene in Illerkirchberg Photo: Bernd Weissbrod/dpa
BERLIN cup | After the fatal knife attack on a 14-year-old schoolgirl in Illerkirchberg (Baden-Württemberg), there were nationwide dismayed reactions. “The terrible news from Illerkirchberg shocks me,” said Interior Minister Nancy Faeser (SPD). She mourns the dead girl and hopes her wounded comrade will recover. “The police are investigating all precedents with high pressure,” assured Faeser.
Green Party leader Omid Nouripour also said the news of the crime was “difficult to bear”. The rule of law must hold the perpetrators accountable. CDU federal council member Serap Güler was also “shocked and amazed”. He feels sadness and deep sympathy, but also anger towards the offender, “who today took a life and made many more difficult”.
The mayor of Illerkirchberg, Markus Häußler (independent), told local media that the community was in shock. Affected families will be supported.
“It’s terrible.” Baden-Württemberg Interior Minister Thomas Strobl (CDU) promised that the crime would be “completely clarified”. The 14-year-old was “suddenly snatched from his life”. His thoughts are with the mourners.
Sudden attack on students
According to the police, witnesses reported at around 7:30 on Monday morning that a 13-year-old girl and a 14-year-old girl were attacked by a man with a knife in Oberkirchberg near Illerkirchberg in the eastern district of Alb-Donau. Both were on their way to school. The 14-year-old, according to police a German with a migration background, was revived at the scene, but died in the clinic. The 13-year-old suffered serious but not life-threatening injuries.
The attacker came from a nearby asylum seeker accommodation and fled there after the crime, police headquarters in Ulm said. As the special forces approached, they encountered three residents, all refugees from Eritrea. One, a 27-year-old, was injured and required medical attention. A knife was found on him that may have been used in the murder. He is now he is in hospital under police guard. The other two men were taken to the police station.
The motive for the crime is still under investigation, police and prosecutors said. It will also be clarified whether the suspect and the two girls knew each other before. On the spot, the act also evoked memories of an attack in the region in 2019. At the time, four men from Iraq and Afghanistan repeatedly raped a 14-year-old girl in a shelter and were sentenced to two-year prison terms.
The Police and the Public Prosecutor’s Office have launched an appeal to citizens after the crime in progress: We are aware “that facts of this kind arouse fears and emotions”. However, it is requested that “no generic suspicion be raised against strangers, protection seekers or asylum seekers, or that such suspicions be favored or supported”.
Instrumentalization of the act from the right
But the longing faded quickly. Because the AfD did exactly that on Monday evening: AfD Federal Deputy Mariana Harder-Kühnel tweeted that “this state is dysfunctional”. Their demand: “Deport criminal migrants, close borders.” AfD Federal Council member Maximilian Krah recorded, “mass immigration is immigration with a knife.” AfD Member of Parliament René Springer tweeted: “If I were interior minister, the Illerkirchberg offender would already be on the deportation plane.”
And even the head of the AfD of Thuringia, Björn Höcke, declared that “there is no longer a safe hinterland”. The federal association AfD wrote on its Facebook account that “the real culprits are in the Federal Republic”. The “irresponsible policy of open borders must end”.
Left-wing politician Bernd Riexinger sharply criticized the AfD for these statements. “Instead of mourning the girl who died in Illerkirchberg, stop and shut up, the Nazi AfD immediately took the opportunity to agitate against the refugees,” he tweeted. “This is cowardly and shows once again what kind of spirit I am.”
