Neo-Nazi Victim Battling to the Death - 09/29/2006

By Roman Heflik in Birmingham

Noel Martin plans to take his own life in less than a year. Just over 10 years ago, a neo-Nazi attack left him paralyzed from the neck down. He plans to fight right-wing extremists to the very end.

Noel Martin has already chosen July 23, 2007 to be the day he dies. On that evening, his pulse will gradually slow down until it stops completely. He has decided to die as a result of a lethal blend of drugs -- administered in Switzerland by Dignitas, an organization that offers its clients medically assisted suicide.

Noel Martin has only 297 days left. But time, he says, is also limited for the neo-Nazis who ruined his life.

Martin publicly announced his decision in June, 10 years after the attack that left him paralyzed and destroyed his will to live. He plans to celebrate his last birthday -- he'll be 48 –- and then drink the cocktail that will put him out of his misery.

He has 297 days left.

The attack occurred on June 16, 1996 in Mahlow, a town in the former East German state of Brandenburg where the dark-skinned, Jamaican-born Briton was employed as a construction worker. A stone crashed through the windshield of his car and Martin's car veered off the road. He remembers seeing a tree careening towards him and jerking the steering wheel.

And then, a thud. Darkness.

When Martin woke up, he was lying on his back. He heard a voice. "Can you feel my hand on your leg?" it asked him. "But you're not touching my leg," Martin replied.

"I am not a part of life. I just exist"

Two young Germans, Sandro R. and Mario P., had thrown a lump of concrete at Martin's car. They were 17 and 24 years old at the time and their motive was "explicit xenophobia," as a court later determined. They were sentenced to five and eight years in prison. Noel Martin never got an apology, but by now he doesn't care any more. "It would be a waste of time. God will take care of them," he says, "life will take care of them." Both of his attackers are now free. But Martin is still imprisoned –- in his own body.

The attack left Noel Martin paralyzed from the neck down. "I am not a part of life," he says, 10 years and three months later, "I just exist." At home in Birmingham, he leans his heavy head against the headrest of his giant wheelchair. He fixes his weary eyes on his interviewer. "Everything has to be figured out by your head. It's torture, mental torture," he sighs. Martin will never be able to move his arms or legs again and he'll never be able to feel what his fingertips touch. He'll never have sex again, never go to the toilet by himself. Nor will he ever feel his own heartbeat.

Martin feels comparatively happy this afternoon. He was up at 8:00 and it only took until noon for him to be washed, massaged, and dressed.

Mornings aren't always this easy. Sometimes his ulcers bleed and bleed, until his dark face goes ashen and his eyes fall shut from sheer exhaustion. Sometimes his nurses slap his face to wake him up again. They have to slap his face –- that's the only part of his body that Noel Martin can still feel.

Losing control of your body hurts

On this particular afternoon, the idea of death seems absurd. Warm rays of sun shine through the garden window, casting patterns of light on the living room carpet. He looks around at the gilt moulding between the high ceiling and the green walls, at the heavy wooden furniture, the red leather couch and his television. There's a little fire place built into one wall. His huge old desk is covered with photo albums and sheets of paper. Dozens of birthday cards line the cornice along the wall. The room is full of life. This is Martin's kingdom. This is where he spends almost every day.

His wheelchair is in the middle of the room. His nurses have dressed him in black trousers and a casual black sweater. His roundish paunch protrudes underneath the sweater. "I used to be fit," Martin says. "I used to run in the mornings. Then I would do sit-ups. I did kung-fu and boxing too." Today he's plagued by chills and hot flashes. His broad shoulders have gone slack. He still has some control over his right shoulder –- which allows him to operate his wheelchair with a joystick and use his phone. Apart from that, Martin needs the assistance of his eight nurses for everything else.

They keep an eye on him 24 hours a day. Even now, a small woman with a blonde ponytail is standing in the doorway. "Cath, give me some wine please," Martin says. The nurse reaches him a glass of chilled white wine. He drinks it through a straw. "Good. Give me a cigarette please," he says. Cathy puts one in his mouth and lights it. Martin takes a drag. Then Cathy removes the cigarette from his mouth –- until he wants to take another drag.

This constant dependence on other people is agony for Martin. "I can never be alone." The self-confident man suffers from his loss of control. Suddenly he twists his face into a grimace –- he can't stand it anymore. "Cath, scratch please." The nurse wipes his face with a towel. This will happen about 10 times before the afternoon is over.

"You can't suffer every day of your life"

Jacqueline, his strong-willed wife, used to take care of him. She died of cancer six years ago. Two days before she passed away, they married at Jacqueline's sickbed -- after having lived together for 18 years. Martin says he spent 36 hours with her after their marriage before she fell into a coma. "I miss her every day," he says. His voice, which normally sounds so resolute, cracks. He can see her grave outside in the garden.

After the attack, he promised Jacqueline to try and hold on for eight years. On the evening of July 23, 2007, 11 years will have passed since the event that changed his life forever.

Martin's announcement that he plans to commit suicide has caused an uproar. The phone rang constantly for days. "The only one who didn't call was God," he jokes. Countless journalists asked him for an interview and outraged Christians urged him not to commit such a sin. But Martin says he doesn't need their advice. "Cath, cigarette please." He takes a deep drag and says that "99 percent of them" would already have "ended it all" years ago, in his situation. What does he think about other handicapped people who want to "end it all"? "Suffering is individual," he replies. "And you can't suffer every day." No, he says, he's not afraid to die. "No one escapes death anyway." He seems relaxed now –- almost cheerful. These are thoughts he has often thought.

Neo-Nazis are already celebrating the imminent death of the man they despise in their Internet forums. After all, the attack gave rise to an unprecedented campaign against xenophobia. Citizens in Mahlow spontaneously started up a local project called "Tolerant Mahlow." Martin returned to the city in 2001 and he called on its citizens to continue to stand up for the rights of others. He also established a charitable foundation against xenophobia.

Right-wing extremists, for their part, see it as a provocation that he is still alive. One of their Internet forums features a post by a neo-Nazi urging Martin to burn himself alive on a market square, noting that this would save money. The author of the post adds that he would be "happy to donate the gasoline." What does Martin think about the neo-Nazis? "Foolish people who know nothing about life. They love white skin, but they lie down in the sun to get a tan." He says to let them talk –- after all, there is such a thing as freedom of speech. "I wasn't afraid of them then, and I'm not afraid of them now," he says.

Noel Martin hasn't yet turned his back on life

Black people still aren't safe in Brandenburg today, 10 years after the attack on Noel Martin. "The government should make sure everyone can go wherever they want and be safe," he says. Martin knows how far-reaching the problem is. The first time he heard the word "nigger" was decades ago, back home, in the British industrial town of Birmingham.

And so Martin wants to make the most of the time that's left before the evening of July 23, 2007. His nurses, Cathy and Charity, spread out sheets of paper on the carpet. Martin discusses his appointments with the two nurses and makes a few phone calls. He hasn't turned his back on life yet. He's working on his book and in October he has a meeting with Brandenburg's governor, Matthias Platzeck in London. Later, he wants to return to Mahlow another time.

"I want to tell people they should stop apologizing for their past. They should just teach their children the value of life," he says. He's sure to receive public attention now –- and Martin is using it to support his foundation and other projects.

The right-wing extremists may well celebrate his death as a late triumph, but Noel Martin takes a very different view. "I have some bad news for those people," Martin says. He raises his head and his voice as if he were preparing to give a speech: "Of the 6 billion people in the world, 5 billion are people of color. Sooner or later they'll all mix." He grins. "Who knows? Maybe the children of these Nazis will marry a black man or a black woman one day?"

He likes the idea. The Nazis are running out of time –- with or without Noel Martin.

Source:  Spiegel

An Indian opinion and experience of racism in Germany

I am a US citizen of Indian descent and speaking for my circle of friends who are also of Indian descent. We all believe that Germany is not a conducive environment for foreigners.

One of my friends has over 30 patents and is the chief engineer for a multi-100 million dollar high tech company he helped build. When he was asked to move to Hamburg to take over a division there, he was met with such hostility by highly educated employees and thinly disguised racial insults that he declined the job. The division was shut down a little later. It would be a stretch to say this was the reason but his presence would have given the division a fighting chance. Racism hurt everybody here, the German citizens who lost jobs, my friend who could not experience the pleasure of living in Germany which he was looking forward to.

I personally have been to over 56 countries on business and only in Germany have I ever been asked for my passport while walking down the street. Immigration officers have also been much ruder than in other European countries. As a result, I no longer fly through Germany if I can avoid it and do not plan on expanding into Germany. I am just a small blip on the economic radar for Germany but there are 200 million successful Indians or people of Indian origin who would like nothing better than to have a profitable and mutually beneficial relationship with Germany's people.

My friends of Chinese origin share the same view and there are probably as many of them if not more.

- Sameer V.
San Jose, CA, USA

-As told to SPIEGEL Magazine

Source: Spiegel

Mügeln Mayor Slammed for Trivializing Racist Attack - 08/31/2007

Two weeks after eight Indians were attacked by a mob in the Eastern German town of Mügeln, its mayor can't see what all the fuss is about. Leading politicians are shocked that he continues to downplay the incident and there are calls for his resignation.

The reverberations following the racist attack on eight Indians in the Eastern German town of Mügeln two weeks ago are still being felt in Germany. Politicians from across the spectrum reacted with anger after Mügeln Mayor Gotthard Deuse complained that a media campaign had been whipped up against the town and criticized leading politicians for their "malicious" comments. His own party, the business friendly Free Democrats, is distancing itself from him and there are calls for him to resign.

Mügeln Mayor Gotthard Deuse feels his town is the victim of a poisonous media campaign. As far as he is concerned there's no right-wing extremism in the town.

There was widespread revulsion in Germany and beyond after eight Indian men were chased through the streets of Mügeln by a mob of 50 people on Aug. 19. The men took refuge in a pizzeria as the crowd chanted "Foreigners Out!" and "Germany for Germans," before breaking in and beating up the men inside.

In a classic example of pouring oil onto the fire Deuse, in an interview given to the right-wing Young Freedom newspaper, complained about the rush to judge his town in what he called a "media campaign." He completely denied that there was a problem with right-wing extremism in the town and accused politicians like Transport Minister Wolfgang Tiefensee -- who is also responsible for overseeing development in former East Germany, of making uninformed "populist" comments about the attacks.

Tiefensee had already warned against belittling the events in Mügeln and he hit back at Deuse on Friday, telling the Rheinische Post that "citizens and groups had to be courageous in tackling extreme-right tendencies. Looking away and downplaying the problem is exactly the wrong thing to do."

Tiefensee pointed out that the radical right was stronger in the former East Germany than it was in the West. "There is an historic lack of exposure to immigration and cultural diversity," he said, while admitting that the difficult job market plays a role in radicalization. But the Social Democrat politician insisted that this didn’t justify "threats and acts of violence against foreigners or anyone else."

Deuse, who has been mayor of Mügeln for the past 17 years, had already insisted that there was no far-right scene in the town. In his interview he complained about the "poisonous" attacks on the town and accused some politicians of not knowing what they were talking about and of being either ignorant or "deliberately malicious." He regretted that Germans were not allowed show their own national pride and said "I am proud to be a German."

Leading politicians from the Social Democrats (SPD) and Green Party have demanded Deuse resign as mayor, while his party has tried to distance itself from the mayor and his remarks.

SPD member Sebastian Edathy, who is chairman of the parliamentary domestic affairs committee told the Mitteldeutsche Zeitung "Mr. Deuse should ask himself whether he can be of any more use in his position. I have my doubts." Green Party parliamentary leader Renate Künast declared: "The mayor of Mügeln has to go!" The Left Party's deputy parliamentary leader Bodo Ramelow said that he had the impression that the mayor was "xenophobic deep down."

As for the FDP, General Secretary Dirk Niebel said Deuse is responsible for his own words and insisted: "There can be no relativization when it comes to acts of violence and xenophobic attitudes. That is the basis of an open-minded and tolerant society for all democrats."

Source: Spiegel

Severe Anti-Semitism Hits Youth Football in Germany - 06/01/2007

By Heike Baldauf

They were two teams of 14-year-olds. But that didn't seem to matter. Right-wing fans rained anti-Semitic and racist insults down on a youth-league game in Eastern Germany last month. Police are investigating, but it's far from an isolated incident.

The Ascension Day holiday was to be a big day for the football community in Wurzen, a small town of 15,000 near Leipzig in former Communist-ruled East Germany. The local junior league had a match scheduled with a team from the industrial city of Chemnitz, formerly known as Karl-Marx-Stadt and located near the Czech border.

 A number of fans had found their way to the stadium and by the time the whistle blew for kick-off, they were in high spirits, swilling beer and chanting supporters’ songs. The usual horde of young neo-Nazi skinheads and xenophobes were in the stands, looking for trouble.

Assistant referee Henry Lickfeldt elected to call the cops after the match due to the racist epithets rained down on the players from the stands -- and from some of the players themselves. The two Vietnamese-German players Hoang Long, 14 and Le Duc Huy, 14, got the brunt of it.

Then the taunts began. The fans struck up a welcoming chorus for the visiting junior soccer team: “We’ll build a subway from Chemnitz to Auschwitz…” You "Fiji pigs," they yelled at two 14-year-olds who were subbed in. You "foreigner pigs!" They made monkey noises every time they touched the ball. They also targeted the 14-year-old goalkeeper from the visiting team: "Jewish pig, go fuck your Jewish mother," they yelled.

'They're Making Us Look Like Such Monsters'

The crowd didn't just target the visitors. A linesman flagged an offside call, earning him a torrent of abuse including: "Get it right, Jew, or we’ll come and pull your foreskin off."

Despite a number of attempts by the referees to get the crowd under control, the insults continued.

The kids from Chemnitz were not to be put off their game, eventually winning 2-0. But referee Christine Weigelt was not going to let matters rest there. From notes made during the game, she compiled a report on the anti-Semitic and racist abuse and handed it to district police chief Bernd Merbitz.

Her deputy referee Henry Lickfeldt added his protest. But some sport functionaries sided with the rabble, branding Weigelt and other accusers as liars tarnishing Wurzen’s reputation. Sports Association President Heiko Wandel said Weigelt had lost control of the match: "They’re making us look like monsters," he said. "We’ve got Vietnamese and Russians among our players. They should stop putting on such a show."

Many of the insults also came from the players on the field. Indeed, one player from the Wurzen team was barred from playing while the league looked into accusations that he had racially assaulted a Chemnitz player with a Vietnamese background. Wandel was not impressed. "That is going too far," he said. "I'll cover for him. He promised me that he didn't say anything. One is allowed to insult the Germans, but as soon as a Vietnamese is insulted, it is exaggerated."

The Vietnamese boy in question, son of a communist-era immigrant family, was given a red card just as the game was ending for shoving the player he accuses of having insulted him. "I would like too apologize for doing that," the boy said later. "But I won't put up with remarks like that." On the other side of the ball, a father of one of the Wurzel players apologized to the Chemnitz team for the insults.

Far Right Fixtures

But how could such a thing happen, and that at a children's league game? That is exactly the question that Harald Sather, chairman of the Committee of Referees in the state of Saxony is asking. "We have to get to the bottom of all this," he said. "Abuse is going too far. Foreign players deserve respect. How could this happen at a juniors’ game?"

For Germany’s amateur sports world, the involvement of 12- to-14-year-old kids in incidents during the game at Wurzen is a worrying new trend, while abuse by far-right fans at soccer fixtures in East Germany is a fact of life. After major disturbances in amateur football in Saxony last February, 60 matches were cancelled on a single day as a punishment.

Police have promised to press charges. But Germany’s Federation of Active Soccer Fans claims no police action would have been taken had referee assistant Lickfeldt not taken the initiative to call the police. Indeed, after the game, Lickfeldt says that the referee supervisor from Wurzen said he had seen nothing out of the ordinary and warned the referees against filing a report. He also says that the Wurzen trainer told him: "If you write something, then play it down. The German Football Association has their eyes out for such things."

Martin Endemann from the fans' association says that is what normally happens. "Referees often look the other way in such situations in order not to have any trouble. We have seen this again and again over the years." His group, based in Hanau in Western Germany, is running a campaign against intolerance and xenophobia in the country's football stands.

Wurzen -- which has 1,700 unemployed among its 15,000 residents and is famed for a cookie factory, the poet Joachim Ringelnatz and a mail-order firm specializing in far-right music and clothes -- was put on the map by its neo-Nazis and anti-Semites after communism collapsed in 1989. Skinheads and hard-right thugs chased Portuguese workers through the streets and attacked a hostel for asylum-seekers in the 1990s.

Wurzen’s mayor Jürgen Schmidt, a member of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic party (CDU), is keeping silent about the Ascension Day soccer match. He happens to be vice-president of the Wurzen club and shares a council administration table with local functionaries of the far-right NPD party.

Source: Spiegel

Neo-Nazis Attack Theater Group in Eastern German Town - 06/12/2007

A group of actors were beaten up by neo-Nazis in the eastern German city of Halberstadt and have accused the police of being slow to respond. The region's premier says he is appalled by the attack.

A group of actors who were attacked and injured by neo-Nazis in the eastern city of Halberstadt on Friday night have accused the police of handling their case too hesitantly.

The theater group of 14 actors were on their way to a pub after a debut performance on Friday when they were attacked and beaten up by eight far-right youths. Several of the victims had teeth knocked out and required medical treatment for broken noses, injured ribs and jaws and eye injuries.

Far-right extremists attacked the actors because one of them had a punk hairstyle, newspaper reports said.

Police failed to arrest the 22-year-old main assailant even though he returned to the scene while the victims were being questioned, a regional government official said. "The man was checked by police but released before they found out about his prior convictions," Rüdiger Erben, interior ministry secretary for the state of Saxony-Anhalt, told Mitteldeutsche Zeitung newspaper.

The man, a known neo-Nazi, was arrested again on Sunday evening. Police are still searching for seven other assailants.

A number of people witnessed the attack and did nothing to help. The theater group had just finished a performance of the "Rocky Horror Picture Show" and one of the actors had a punk hairstyle in keeping with his role. That appears to have been enough to provoke the neo-Nazis they came across, newspaper reports said.

The premier of Saxony-Anhalt, Wolfgang Böhmer, said he was appalled by the case.

"It's a sad fact that far-right extremists are becoming increasingly brutal. If people are attacked and injured just because of their appearance it's an appalling crime," Böhmer said.

Source: Spiegel

German Xenophobia - Spiegel Readers views - 01/22/2008

A SPIEGEL ONLINE opinion piece on xenophobia in Germany has elicited strong reactions among foreigners living here. Although some say racism is not a problem, many have experienced xenophobia in their daily lives.

Immigration has -- once again -- become a hot political topic in Germany after Hesse Governor Roland Koch called for a crackdown on "criminal young foreigners" as part of his campaign for re-election. Immigrant groups have criticized his rhetoric for being xenophobic, but Koch's populist stance did strike a chord with many voters.

In a recent opinion piece, SPIEGEL ONLINE editor David Crossland wrote that Germany is doing a bad job of integrating its immigrants. "Maybe it's the Germans' romantic yearning for purity and cleanliness, for a 'Heile Welt,' a 'Perfect World,' that renders them prone to a collective xenophobia," he wrote. "This nation of dog lovers goes for pure breeds."

SPIEGEL ONLINE International invited readers who have experience of living in Germany as a foreigner to write in to share their views. Here is a selection of their letters on being an Ausländer in Germany.

Dear Spiegel Online,

I am an Asian scientist working in Munich. I lived in China and Singapore before I moved to Germany. I was offered a pre-doctorate position in Singapore from a private research institution with full pay before I came to Germany. But I still decided to look for a position in Germany, because I wanted to live in Europe. The major motives for such a move were firstly, the freedom of expression that European countries offer; secondly, the superior infrastructure of the German research system; and thirdly, the European values of tolerance and integration.

I was not disappointed at all when it comes to freedom of expression and the infrastructure in Germany. But I was utterly shocked when it comes to integration and tolerance. I never suffered explicit racist attacks like those which happened in eastern Germany. But I was exposed to a subtle yet stubborn kind of racism on a daily basis. This mostly takes the form of social exclusion -- I always felt that I am not and will never be allowed to become a normal member of society, despite holding a promising academic record and decent linguistic skills.

In the beginning, I regarded social rejection as a result of linguistic insufficiency. Therefore I spent a large amount of time improving my German. At the moment my spoken German is close to fluency. But I was completely disappointed about the results of my effort. Instead of feeling more integrated in the society, I actually discovered even more xenophobia around me, because now I understand what is written in newspapers and on street placards. Also, I became aware that people throw me angry looks when I mispronounce German, or give me suspicious looks on the U-Bahn. It is a constant battle on my side to handle such things. I am determined to move to another country once I finish my studies. It is hard to leave such a good working environment behind, but I see no hope for real integration here.

I have spoken with other colleagues of mine, who are either foreigners or have a foreign background. Many of them suffer the same kind of social rejection. There are very few things we can do except opting to leave the country when we finish our training. But it is detrimental to the intellectual progress and economic growth of Germany when even people of higher education fail to integrate into the society.

I am not saying that there should be any kind of favoritism towards intellectual foreigners, or that there should be immediate and absolute equality among Germans and foreigners. What I hope to see is more cultural sensitivity and inter-cultural communication. People should start to understand that foreigners are assets, not threats. And the only ones who can push for cultural sensitivity and exchange on a large scale are the mass media and the government.

-- Name withheld

'Germany Is not Where I Want my Kids to Grow Up'

Dear Spiegel Online,

As an Asian, I felt so much discrimination in all aspects of life, especially in school. I came to Germany at age 16 and was hoping to go to university. Almost all the high schools we went to rejected me solely for the fact that my German wasn't good enough. German relatives kept telling me that I should do an apprenticeship instead because attending a Gymnasium (university-track high school -- Ed.) is hard and that I might not be able to handle it.

People thought I was dumb just because my German was elementary. I never got encouragement from anyone because it was always made clear to me that either my German was not good enough or I was not good enough, without even knowing that I graduated in the top percent of my class. Due to my own and my family's persistence I went to an all-girl Gymnasium in Freiburg and eventually attended university in Tübingen.

Everyday I am reminded to my face that I am an Ausländer. No matter how I try to explain to people that I have nothing left in my home country and my new life is here, they always treat me as if I am exotic and that everything in German life is still new and novel to me. I have a German name, I have a German passport, but I look Asian, and therefore am a foreigner.

I immigrated to the US now and am attending university here. Here, I am not treated as a foreigner but as a person and my skin color doesn't matter as much as in Germany. I have a lot of opportunities that weren't possible in Germany as a foreigner.

I have lived in three different continents. For all the historical charm and romance of Germany, it is for me now only a place I will regularly visit but not a place where I want my kids to grow up in.

-- Veronica

 'There Were Times When I Feared for my Life'

I am an ex-British soldier, my wife is German and I have lived in Germany for over 20 years. I am a truck driver in a big German firm. About 80 percent of the drivers are German-Russian, the rest are German and British. I am sick to death of hearing how the Russians should go home and how they are all criminals.

I don't care where people come from, there is good and bad in every race. I myself suffer name calling and intolerance. I have lost count of the times I have been called an "island monkey" (German slang for British people -- Ed.) and told I should go home. There were a couple of times in eastern Germany when I feared for my life -- and I don't scare easily.

Unless we all learn to live together, I really do fear for the future of Germany. Even today when I speak German, I still sound British and, yes, people are funny in shops when they hear this. When I talk to a fellow Brit over the CB radio in my cab we are told to go home and that we are English pigs. Some even play Hitler tapes -- how sad is that? Still, this is a minority and I still love the country and I know some great Germans.

Even so, in some parts of Germany I would not like to have dark skin -- sad, don't you think?

-- Name withheld

'I'm Sorry, Are You Black?'

Dear Spiegel Online,

I am a German, married to a Polish woman. We met in the USA about 10 years ago and have now lived in Germany for about 9 years.

We lived in Heidelberg and Frankfurt and have had many international friends over the years. During these years, a lot of things have happened that have made me see my fellow countrymen in a different light. First of all, my wife speaks fluent German, but since that wasn't the case when we met, we of course talked English to each other and it has remained that way until today. So over the years we had to defend our speaking English to each other many times, even to close friends. People said: "Why aren't you talking German to each other? You live in Germany, you should speak German!"

Just after we got married, my wife was in charge of finding us a new apartment. Imagine our surprise when my wife called realtors and found there were no places available, but when I called, we were able to look at three apartments in a day. In one case where we went to look at the apartment, the owners clearly didn't want us to move in there because of my wife's foreign accent. I was flabbergasted by this and I thought I must have misunderstood, but at the same time there was a Polish NATO soldier looking at one of the apartments and they didn't want him either. In his case, they used an excuse that they do not take soldiers since they move too much (with us, the excuse was that a "nice academic couple" had apparently called dibs on the apartment).

In a related case, I had a South African friend who spoke fluent German. In a telephone conversation with a possible landlord, it somehow came up that he was from South Africa. He was promptly asked the question: "I'm sorry but I was wondering and I really need to ask -- are you black?"

When I was a 16-year-old kid living in the United States, my friends around me were surprised to learn that I didn't consider myself American. Some of them were first-generation Americans as well, born to foreign parents, but they never considered themselves not to be Americans, although of course they would proudly say "I'm German, Irish, Greek..." or whatever when it came to their heritage.

In Germany, I have friends who were born, lived, went to school and worked in Germany. Still, one of my friends frequently starts a conversation with a sentence like "the village where I am from in Croatia" even though she was born here and lived here all her life. Another friend, born in Germany to Turkish parents, was seriously discussing with me that she wasn't even sure how and if living in Germany has had any impact on her in terms of giving her a German identity.

The only chance I see for success is the integration of our society into a European society as a whole where immigration, cross-border movements and "foreignness" are considered to be assets for a functioning society.

-- York Weyers

Dear Spiegel Online,

I read Mr. Crossland's opinion piece and I do agree that Germany needs to change its attitude towards foreigners.

I am a student from India currently pursuing my Master's here. I have been living in Germany for two years now -- 11 months in Cottbus, and the rest in Berlin. While it is true that I have met some wonderful human beings in my two years here, it is also true that by and large we, the foreigners, are regarded way too suspiciously.

Fortunately for me, despite my dark skin, I have not faced any pushed-into-a-corner kind of incidents that I keep hearing about. That may be because I take things in my stride, go out of my way not to offend people or simply because I choose to ignore things most of the time. But I experienced a couple of incidents when the ugly face of racism was bared to one and all. And every time I am shocked anew before a helpless rage takes over me, which I need to glaze over with indifference for my own survival here.

Once in Cottbus, during a hip-hop night at a student bar, which of course attracted the black students from our university, someone threw a stink bomb inside the bar forcing all of us to run towards the exit, eyes hurting and throats constricting due to the nauseous gas. While we were waiting outside for the smell to diffuse, a man with his hood up ran up the stairs, screamed "Ausländer raus!" ("Foreigners out!") and ran away before we could react.

And the other time, a club in Prenzalauer Berg, the happening district of Berlin, denied us entrance because there were three black people amongst us (well, four if you count me). We were just told that they have the right to deny anyone they want and that the club was filled to its capacity. The funny part is they did not even try to wait for us to get out of sight before they let others in.

It would be easy to handle if it is only a certain bunch of people -- say the neo-Nazis -- out to get you. What makes it difficult is the fact that the average people that you meet have so many prejudices against you that everything you do, even before you do it, is written on the debit side of the balance sheet. If my friend, who is white, crosses a street when the light is red, she is in a hurry. And if I do the same, someone is waiting to say "schwarze Schlampe" ("black slut") or something similar.

And you would think that in a university, things might be different. But oh no! It gets worse there. You have to start battling prejudices from the word go. If you come here from the developing world, you are here to squander the precious resources of Germany, while all along you want to stay on in the country by hook or crook.

Don't get me wrong. I am not trying to say I have nothing but bad experiences in Germany. I have had times when the unexpected generosity and helpfulness of strangers reduced me almost to tears. To be fair, perhaps, things are not so different anywhere else.

I came here with an open mind and I see what I see. Tomorrow I will leave because I can afford to. But I see around me a lot of people who will hang on, despite racism, despite prejudices, despite everything. And if something is not done right now, I am afraid it may be too late. History already showed us what could happen if we let malcontent grow.

-- Name withheld

Source: Spiegel

Neo-Nazi Shooting Spree - 07/17/2007

A gang of right-wing extremists invaded a beach in Eastern Germany on Sunday, shouting racist abuse at day-trippers, making the banned Hitler salute and shooting a submachine gun into the air.

It was a perfect afternoon to go to the lake. Finally, after weeks of cold and rain, Germany on the weekend was bathed in warm sunlight. A Sunday at the water was just the thing.

But day-trippers relaxing by the Krakower See in the Eastern German state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania got a bit more than they bargained for on Sunday. A horde of right-wing extremists arrived on the scene shouting racist slogans, making the banned Hitler salute -- and shooting a submachine gun into the air. Beach bathers were terrified by the seeming invasion.

Neo-Nazis have become a lasting problem in some parts of Eastern Germany.

According to the police, six men and one woman drove to the lake in a pick-up truck where they yelled racists slogans and verbally abused the families bathing there, most of whom were ethnic Germans who had moved to Germany from Eastern Europe following the collapse of communism. Such immigrants, many of whom speak only poor German despite their background, are often targeted by right-wing radicals.

The extremists some of whom were drunk, then shot a submachine gun into the air at least 17 times, according to the police. The ordeal only came to an end when a few of the men at the beach succeeded in overpowering the neo-Nazis and holding them down until the police arrived.

The seven suspects, who range in age from 21 to 29, were charged with breaking firearms law and making the banned Hitler salute.

The state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania is something of a stronghold for the extreme right. Germany's far-right National Democratic Party (NPD) won 7.3 percent in elections there in September 2006, crossing the 5 percent threshold and securing six seats in the state legislature. And there has been a number of incidents of neo-Nazis insulting or attacking holiday-makers in the state in recent years.

Indians Attacked by Crowd at Street Party - 08/20/2007

A group of eight Indians was attacked by a mob at a street party in eastern Germany on the weekend. All were injured, one seriously. The police deny there was a political motive behind the attack despite calls of "foreigners out."

Despite a mob's calls of "foreigners out," police are denying there was a far-right motive behind an attack on a group of Indians in eastern Germany this weekend.

The eight men were attacked by a mob of around 50 Germans at a street party in the early hours of Sunday in the small town of Mügeln in the eastern German state of Saxony. The trigger for the violence was a brawl on the dance floor in a party tent shortly before 1 a.m., police said. The reason for the brawl was not yet clear.

Singh Gorvinda was one of the Indians injured in the attack.

The Indians left the tent where the dance was being held but were then attacked by the mob, which chased them across the town's market place until they took shelter in a pizzeria run by an Indian. The owner let them in, but the mob tried to kick in the doors of the restaurants as a large crowd looked on. The restaurant owner's car was also seriously damaged.

Seventy police officers were called in to restore order. Fourteen people were injured in the incident, including the eight Indians, four of the attackers and two police officers. One of the Indians and one of the attackers were taken to hospital for treatment. Two of the attackers, aged 21 and 23, were arrested on Saturday night but later released. The police have set up a task force to investigate the incident.

In remarks to the German news agency DDP Monday, a police spokeswoman in Leipzig denied there was a neo-Nazi motive behind the attack, despite eye-witnesses accounts of people calling for "foreigners out."

There were reports Monday that the police had been warned in advance of the attack but had done nothing to prevent it. Mayor Gotthard Deuse told the German news station N24 that there had been warnings of possible problems at the street party. However, the police spokeswoman denied this, saying that the warning in question had been sent to a youth club in the town, warning of a robbery. This had "absolutely nothing to do" with the attacks, the spokeswoman said. The mayor said there were no neo-Nazis in the town and that, if the incident did have a far-right motive, it was most likely caused by people from outside the city.

Some of the men were merchants living in the area, police said. "They just wanted to take part in the celebrations," a police spokesman told the Associated Press.

Attacks on foreigners are far from unusual in eastern German states such as Saxony, where there are concerns that far-right groups are gaining in strength and taking on institutional roles in some places. The far-right, neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD) holds several seats in Saxony's state assembly, having won over 9 percent of the vote in the 2004 state election.

Source: Spiegel