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Violence by immigrant youths rattles Germany

A brutal war of words has broken out between the two major parties here over violence committed by youths with immigrant backgrounds, and neither side is backing down.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has found herself straddling the divide, caught between her contradictory roles as party leader during a heated regional election campaign and as the head of a delicate coalition government.

The controversy began suddenly late last month, when a 20-year-old Turk and a 17-year-old Greek were caught on videotape severely beating a 76-year-old retiree in the Munich subway. The pensioner's skull was fractured in the attack, which shocked the nation. Far from a brief flare-up, the political battle over crime, punishment and ethnicity has only intensified since.

Germany has its difficulties with its immigrants, of which Turks are the largest group, but nothing like the raw conflict seen in other European countries, particularly France. Germany's Nazi past and, as a result, the pains that mainstream German politicians usually take to avoid even the appearance of overt nationalist sentiment, have tended to restrain the kind of debate pursued more openly by far-right parties elsewhere on the continent.

Yet there are signs that could be changing. Roland Koch, a Christian Democrat and the premier in the state of Hesse, home to Frankfurt, seized on the Munich attack as an opportunity to push for tougher penalties for juvenile immigrants who commit crimes. Voters in Hesse and Lower Saxony go to the polls on Jan. 27 in closely watched races for their state parliaments, with Hamburg following next month.

At an election rally on Sunday before thousands of supporters, Koch made the typical candidate's speech, touching on roads and schools, chances missed by his Social Democratic predecessors and the successes of his own government. The loudest cheers came when he turned to his theme of law and order.

"Anyone who raises their fist in this country will experience the combined resistance of the entire civil society of this republic," Koch said. His position struck a chord with Christian Democratic voters.

"The others, their politics are all illusion and Utopia, as if all people are the same," said Herbert Thiel, 66, who had come from the Hessian town of Eschborn for the rally.
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