Police broke up a neo-Nazi concert in Thuringia’s central city of Apolda on October 6 evening as the event turned violent after high-hurdle legal tussles between authorities and organizers over rights to assembly and public safety.
Civic groups joined by Thuringia’s center-left leaders had staged vigils earlier Saturday in Apolda. Far-right organizers had staged a similar, improvised concert on the city’s market square on Friday after being officially denied outlying townships as concert venues.
Germany’s DPA press agency and public MDR broadcasting said police using pepper spray began dispersing more than 700 concertgoers Saturday when stones and bottle were thrown. Eight officers received minor injuries.
Police had fenced off one-third of Apolda’s market square and subjected concertgoers to individual entry checks for the event labelled by its organizers as “rock against foreign inundation.”
Source: DW
