Anti-refugee right-wingers go on rampage in Germany, police say

Over 200 masked right-wing demonstrators, carrying placards with racist overtones, went on a rampage in the eastern city of Leipzig on Monday night, throwing fireworks, breaking windows and vandalizing buildings, police said.

As roughly 2,000 anti-Muslim “LEGIDA” — the Leipzig chapter of PEGIDA, a far right group which opposes Muslim immigration — protesters marched peacefully in the city center, police said a separate group of 211 people walked through the southern Connewitz district before setting of fireworks, erecting barricades and vandalizing property. The top floor of one building caught fire.

The group carried a placard reading “Leipzig bleibt Helle,” or “Leipzig stays light,” an apparent reference to the skin color of residents.

“The 211 people were to a not insignificant degree already on record as being right-wing sympathizers and or members of violent sporting groups,” said police, adding officers brought the situation under control relatively quickly.

Self-styled German soccer “hooligans” tend to join right-wing groups on marches, sometimes starting fights. The Leipzig police put the right-wingers in a bus which was then attacked by left-wing supporters.

Emotions are running high in German cities after throngs of young foreign men allegedly sexually assaulted women at New Year’s Eve celebrations in mass attacks in Cologne and other towns. On Sunday, two Pakistanis and a Syrian man were injured in attacks by gangs of people, apparently motivated by anti-foreigner sentiment.

The New Year’s Eve attacks have deepened public skepticism toward German Chancellor Angela Merkel's open-door refugee policy and her mantra that Germany can cope with the 1.1 million migrants who arrived in the country last year. It has also fueled right-wing groups.

At the LEGIDA protest, people shouted “Merkel must go” and held placards showing the chancellor in a Muslim veil and reading “Merkel, take your Muslims with you and get lost.”

With the number of migrants arriving in Europe's biggest economy set to rise further this year, Merkel is under growing pressure to toughen her line on refugees.

An INSA poll in Bild daily put support for Merkel's conservative bloc down 1 point at 35 percent with the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD), which has strongly criticized the Merkel's refugee policy, up 2 points at 11.5 percent.

INSA traditionally puts AfD slightly higher than most other polling institutes.

Al Jazeera and Reuters