Sex assaults in Germany could result in deportations

Asylum-seekers could be deported if they’re found to have participated in a string of New Year sexual assaults in Cologne, Germany’s justice minister said Thursday.

Meanwhile German officials have warned that anti-immigrant groups have been trying to use the attacks to stir up hatred.

“People rightly want to know what happened on New Year’s Eve, they want to know who the assailants were, and they want to know how such attacks can be prevented in the future”, said Jaeger, sending the 60-year-old into “early retirement” as Germans usually treat such dismissals.

Ministry spokesman Tobias Plate told reporters Friday that police have identified by name 31 suspects believed to have taken part in the crimes.

The state police in Cologne have recorded 170 complaints of crimes, 117 of which involve sexual assault. They included nine Algerians, eight Moroccans, four Syrians, five Iranians, two Germans, and one each from Iraq, Serbia, and the USA, an Interior Ministry spokesman said.

German police have arrested two suspects – males aged 16 and 23, with “North African roots”, a police spokeswoman said Friday, without elaborating, Reuters reported.

Victims’ description of the perpetrators being of “Arab or North African” descent led many to claim the attackers were refugees, adding fuel to the flames of the already sensitive issue of immigration in Germany (the refugee crisis has seen more than 1.1 million refugees arrive in the country).

Earlier this week, Arnold Plickert, leader of the North Rhine-Westphalia branch of Germany’s main police union, stressed that the attacks should not be used as an opportunity for generating anti-refugee sentiment.

There are 31 suspects now being sought by German police.

With the extent of the assaults only coming to light on Monday, three days after the attacks, police have also been accused of hushing up the cases.

He had initially dismissed calls for his resignation but has come under heavy fire, including from Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere, who has said that “the police can not work in this way”. Of them, 71 people were identified, 11 were detained and 32 criminal complaints were registered, the Welt am Sonntag report stated, according to Deutsche Welle.

He said the police handling of New Year’s trouble in Cologne must be investigated and “the public debate surrounding me is liable to complicate and delay this work”.