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Crime

Neo-Nazi link to bombs in German apartment

January 14, 2017

Police suspect two men detained over storing 155 kilos (342 pounds) of explosives of being linked to the far right. One man has admitted attending a meeting of a recently formed group of right-wing extremists.

https://p.dw.com/p/2VoW4
Deutschland Sprengstoff in Lauterecken wird abtransportiert
Image: picture alliance/dpa/H. Tittel

The prosecutor's office in the western German state of Rhineland-Palatinate is investigating whether two men arrested last month for storing large amounts of explosives were members of the Old School Society (OSS), a right-wing terror group suspected of planning attacks on refugee centers and mosques, the magazine "Spiegel" reported on Saturday.

The pair - a man aged 18 from Lauterecken and another aged 24 from Mettmann near Düsseldorf - were detained on December 29.

More than a week later, almost 90 people had to be evacuated from a neighborhood of Lauterecken over safety concerns, as police removed the large cache of home-made explosives from one of the suspect's houses.

"Spiegel" said that during a police interrogation, the younger man had admitted attending an OSS meeting last summer in Rhineland-Palatinate.

He said one of the attendees had vaguely discussed carrying out an attack, asking if anyone could produce a large amount of explosives for him.

The pair told investigators the explosives were obtained to make fireworks for a private New Year's Eve party.

One of the bombs found in the flat was emblazoned with a swastika and symbol of the Nazi SS, police said.

Police believe other evidence also links the pair to right-wing extremism.

The younger suspect had posed for photos on social media wearing T-shirts emblazoned with right-wing logos. His alleged accomplice had been reported to police previously over violations of the Explosives Act and for having right-wing literature on him.

The panel on DW's Quadriga program debated the pros and cons of banning the National Democratic Party (NPD) in 2016.

mm/tj (dpa, AFP)