Cologne New Year’s Eve sex attack rampage ‘was planned on social media’

The shocking spate of sexual assaults during new year festivities in Cologne was organised, Germany’s justice minister Heiko Maas said on Sunday. "For such a horde of people to meet and commit such crimes, it has to have been planned somehow,“ he said. "No one can tell me that this was not coordinated or planned.” If confirmed, the attacks would “take on a new dimension”, he added. His comments came amid reports that North Africans sent out calls on social media for people to gather in Cologne on New Year’s Eve. It brought people from as far as France and Belgium to the city.

The suspicion is that a specific date and an expected crowd was picked

Chancellor Angela Merkel, speaking at a meeting of the Christian Democrats

Cologne police said they have now recorded 379 cases of New Year’s Eve violence – ranging from groping to theft to two reported rapes – with asylum seekers and illegal migrants from North Africa making up the majority of suspects. On Saturday night, riot police broke up far-right protesters as they marched against Germany’s open-door migration policy. Supporters of the xenophobic PEGIDA movement marched in Cologne in protests that briefly turned ugly. Amid the heightened public pressure, Chancellor Angela Merkel hardened her stance toward refugees — some 1.1 million of whom arrived last year — shortly before Saturday’s protest began, promising expulsion for criminals and a reduction in numbers over the longer term to Germany.

If a refugee flouts the rules, then there must be consequences, that means that they can lose their residence right here regardless of whether they have a suspended sentence or a prison sentence.

Angela Merkel

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