Olaf Scholz on Saturday condemned the assault as a menace to democracy.(Representational)

Berlin:

A 17-year-old has turned himself in to police in Germany after an assault on a lawmaker that the nation’s leaders decried as a menace to democracy.

{The teenager} reported to police within the jap metropolis of Dresden early Sunday morning and stated he was “the perpetrator who had knocked down the SPD politician”, police stated in a press release.

Matthias Ecke, 41, European parliament lawmaker for Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats (SPD), was set upon by 4 attackers as he put up EU election posters in Dresden on Friday night time, in keeping with police.

Ecke was “critically injured” and required an operation after the assault, his social gathering stated.

Scholz on Saturday condemned the assault as a menace to democracy.

“We must not ever settle for such acts of violence,” he stated.

Ecke, who’s head of the SPD’s European election checklist within the Saxony area, was simply the newest political goal to be attacked in Germany.

Police stated a 28-year-old man placing up posters for the Greens had been “punched” and “kicked” earlier within the night on the identical Dresden avenue.

Final week two Greens deputies have been abused whereas campaigning in Essen in western Germany and one other was surrounded by dozens of demonstrators in her automobile within the east of the nation.

In accordance with provisional police figures, 2,790 crimes have been dedicated in opposition to politicians in Germany in 2023, up from 1,806 the earlier yr, however lower than the two,840 recorded in 2021, when legislative elections happened.

A bunch of activists in opposition to the far proper has referred to as for demonstrations in opposition to the assault on Ecke in Dresden and Berlin on Sunday, Der Spiegel journal stated.

In accordance with the Tagesspiegel newspaper, Inside Minister Nancy Faeser is planning to name a particular convention with Germany’s regional inside ministers subsequent week to deal with violence in opposition to politicians.

(Apart from the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV employees and is printed from a syndicated feed.)