A fire in Ludwigshafen, the cause of which has not yet been determined, caused the deaths of nine people from Turkey on 3 February.
There has now followed a spate of fires, at least two of which seem to have been caused deliberately. The first took place on 14 February in Aldingen in southwest Germany. A building with Turkish and German occupants started burning at night, but the occupants were saved by a shift worker returning home at night and ringing their bells.
The police has stated that it was a case of arson, and has arrested a German occupant of the building. He has previously been suspected of arson and is said to be psychologically unstable. The prosecution has ruled out a racist motivation.
Another fire in Gelsenkirchen poisoned eight people.
In Marburg evidence of xenophobia
Now there have been three more fires. In a village near Marburg, a house occupied by people from Turkey, a fire broke out in the night from 19 to 20 February. The police have said that there is evidence of arson. No one was injured or killed in the fire.
Authorities have drawn attention to the fact that the word “Hass” (hate) had been written on the house front a few hours before the fire. This word had also been found on the Ludwigshafen house; however, the cause for the Ludwigshafen fire has yet to be established.
According to two local German newspapers, the “Wetzlauer Neue Zeitung” and the “Oberhessische Presse”, a 55-year-old female occupant from Turkey said that shortly before the fire, she saw two people running away from nearby the house and shouting “Foreigners out!”
Meanwhile, there have been two fires in Berlin, too, in the district of Kreuzberg known for its dense population of people from Turkey. In one case, the wooden door of a shop on the ground floor of an apartment building was burnt; the police said that unknown people had set fire to paper on the ground floor.
The police further said that they were investigating possible connections between the fires which caused no injuries or deaths. (GG/TK/AG)
* This news item has collated information from Deutsche Welle, NTV and Radikal.
