New study on anti-Muslim racism in Germany records 898 incidents

Abusive language, threats and attacks: 898 anti-Muslim incidents were recorded by CLAIM, the alliance against Islamophobia and Muslimophobia last year. But the number of unreported cases is likely to be high, according to the initial situation report issued by the alliance, which is funded by Germany's federal ministry for family affairs.

According to the paper presented on Monday, racism is an everyday occurrence for those affected. Many of the cases recorded concerned women. Among the documented cases were 500 verbal attacks - such as ethnophobic statements, insults, threats and coercion. Eleven threatening letters to mosques with "often excessive threats of violence and murder" were reported. There were also obvious links to anti-Semitism. Letters contained Nazi symbols or references to the Nazi era.

The report also mentioned 190 cases of discrimination and 167 cases of "hurtful behaviour". The latter category includes 71 cases of bodily harm, 44 of damage to property, three of arson and 49 other acts of violence. Racist attacks on young people and children are on the rise. There are cases of women being attacked in the presence of their children. Pregnant women had been kicked in the stomach or beaten.

Owing to a lack of comprehensive data collection, the authors assume a high number of unreported cases. The first report includes data from ten counselling centres in five German states, as well as reports from the portal "I-Report", which compiles statistics for politically motivated violence from police and press reports.

Anti-Muslim crimes are often not recognised as such, the report continued. Or those affected do not report them due to a lack of trust in the authorities. CLAIM is therefore calling for, among other things, the expansion of reporting structures and awareness-raising on the issue in government agencies, schools and the health sector.    (dpa/iQ)