[Breaking news update at 11:02 a.m.]
Cologne police Chief Wolfgang Albers has been dismissed, a spokesman for the city’s police department said. The move Friday comes amid uproar over mob sex attacks and muggings in the German city on New Year’s Eve.
[Previous story, posted at 10:00 a.m. ET]
Official: 18 suspects in Cologne attacks are asylum-seekers
(CNN) — German authorities have identified 31 people — 18 of them asylum seekers — as suspects in mob sex attacks and muggings in Cologne on New Year’s Eve, one of several such incidents reported on the same date in European cities.
Six women in Zurich, Switzerland, told authorities they were “robbed from one side, [while] being groped … on the other side” by groups of men described as having dark skin, according to a Zurich police statement released Friday.
And in Helsinki, Finland, police said they are investigating two possible criminal offenses related to New Year’s Eve harassment centered around “a gathering of asylum seekers.”
Both the Zurich and Helsinki allegations became public well after the incidents took place. Critics had chastised authorities and media in Germany for not being upfront earlier about the attacks there — though that news did get out sooner, spurring anti-migrant protests and challenges of Chancellor Angela Merkel for her openness to refugees from war-torn nations like Syria and Iraq.
In Cologne, police spokeswoman Christoph Gilles told reporters Friday that some 170 criminal complaints have been filed related to the apparently coordinated attacks, “at least 120 of which have a sexual angle.” An 80-person investigative team is looking at 250 videos (with about 350 hours of footage), Gilles added.
The suspects include nine Algerian nationals, eight people from Morocco, five from Iran and four from Syria, German interior ministry spokesman Tobias Plate said. Two are German citizens, while one each are from Iraq, Serbia and the United States.
Other German cities had similar attacks that same night, including the northern city of Hamburg, where more than 50 similar incidents were reported.
German Justice Minister Heiko Maas said Thursday that anyone convicted of such crimes could be deported if they were seeking asylum.
“The law allows for people to be deported during asylum proceedings if they’re sentenced to a year or more in prison, and that’s possible with sexual offenses,” Maas said.
Germany’s embrace of migrants challenged
The idea that some refugees fleeing poverty and violence would commit crimes in the countries that welcomed them has spurred anger across Europe and calls for action.
Merkel has been praised in many circles for her not only urging Europe to find a place for such migrants, but backing up her words inside Germany. The nation took in about 800,000 migrants last year, far more than any other European nation.
But critics have questioned the ability of so many migrants, predominantly Muslims, to suddenly adapt to a European way of life, and the apparently coordinated attacks in Cologne and elsewhere in Germany have fueled that sentiment.
The Cologne attacks in particular have triggered protests as well as criticism among German officials. Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere slammed the response of Cologne police, and Spiegel Online reported that groups of men prevented officers from reaching those crying out for help.
“We ran to the police. But we saw the police were so understaffed,” CNN quoted one victim as saying. “They couldn’t take care of us and we as women suffered the price.”
Maas, the justice minister, is among the many who blasted Cologne Mayor Henriette Reker for advising women to keep “more than an arm’s length” from unknown men — comments that Reker later complained were taken out of context.
While officials warned against scapegoating all migrants, Merkel herself has been vocal in slamming the “intolerable” attacks and indicating her government will send a “clear sign” to those who don’t respect German law. She also suggested what happened New Year’s Eve may be symptomatic of a broader problem with regards to endangering women.
“I don’t think these are single cases,” Merkel said Thursday. “People have a right, and we as a state … have the obligation to give the right answers to this.”