Bundestag President Julia Kleckner supported Chancellor Friedrich Merz (each CDU) within the cityscape debate. “Proportionality is no longer true. If you accuse the chancellor of racism, you put all racists into perspective,” she instructed the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
“It’s also a malicious assumption,” Kleckner added. Maximum inhabitants discussions are other. “Assuming Mr Merz’s cityscape is about skin color – none of the normal people have done that,” she mentioned. Maximum understood what he intended, “it’s not that hard.” Other folks would take note, as an example, that “there used to be Christmas markets without security posts and parks didn’t close after a certain time,” Kleckner mentioned. Those statements are neither proper nor left. “It’s just a fact,” she mentioned.
“Feeling insecure”
Regarding Merz’s reference to ladies’s sense of protection in Germany, Kleckner mentioned: “One thing has modified. There’s a feeling of lack of confidence, however the crime statistics additionally display that. In step with police crime statistics for 2024, the overall choice of crimes lowered through 1.7 % in comparison to the former 12 months. Then again, crimes in opposition to non-public freedom – similar to threats, stalking or coercion – greater through 5.3 % in comparison to In 2023, sexual violence greater through 9.3 % – to over 13,000 registered circumstances.
Mertz mentioned in mid-October that there was once a “problem in the cityscape” in Germany that the federal government sought after to fight with deportations. After a lot grievance, Mertz later clarified his observation: Now not all migrants brought about issues, however those that didn’t have everlasting place of abode standing, didn’t paintings and didn’t observe the principles.
Critics see Merz’s statements as each a discriminatory hyperlink between migration and crime and a replica of racist stereotypes.
