The Deputy Mayor of Berlin, Social Democrat Franziska Giffey was attacked this Tuesday by an unknown person who left her “slightly injured,” according to what emerged today, Wednesday, at a time when concern for the victims is increasing in Germany. attacks on politicians after several incidents of this type.

“Ms. Giffey was attacked without warning around 4:15 p.m. from behind by a man who hit her on the head and neck with a bag filled with a hard material,” the police reported. police of the german capital, which is searching for the alleged attacker and investigating a possible political motivation. Giffey, who is also a finance senator in conservative Kai Wegner’s cabinet, went to the hospital to be treated for the pain of the concussion and later left the hospital for her own foot.

The politician herself explained in a ‘thread’ on the social network The incident occurred during a visit to a library in the Rudow district, while speaking with the director of the institution and recounted how he suddenly felt a “hard blow” to the head. Giffey, who in the past was Minister of Family (2018-2021) and mayor-governor of Berlin (2021-2023), declared herself “shocked” by the “increasingly frequent” attacks to which people who are They get involved in politics.

“There is a clear limit. And it is violence against people who represent another point of view, for whatever reasons, in whatever form. These attacks are unjustifiable,” he stated and urged society to take a determined position against these attacks.

On Friday, Matthias Ecke was also attacked

Last Friday, the main candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) for the European elections in the federal state of Saxony, Matthias Ecke was seriously injured when he was attacked while hanging election posters in the eastern German city of Dresden.

The suspects, who apparently minutes before had already attacked another Green volunteer who was also putting up posters, are teenagers with links to the extreme right, according to ongoing research. Two other Green politicians reported yesterday that they had been pushed, threatened and spit upon by two individuals belonging to a group from which the prohibited fascist salute was carried out, also in the city of Dresden.

As a result of the attack against Ecke, this Tuesday the Minister of the Interior, the social democrat Nancy Faeser, held an extraordinary meeting with those responsible for the Interior of the ‘Länder’ to address the issue of violence against politicians. Faeser later announced a agreement to promote a tightening of the penal code to punish acts of violence or harassment against figures in public life and to expedite these judicial processes, although to launch this initiative you must first reach a consensus with the Minister of Justice, the liberal Marco Buschmann.

In statements to public television, Faeser stated that in 2023 acts of violence against elected officials increased by 53% compared to the previous year and spoke of an “escalation of antidemocratic violence.”