67-628: Lutz Bachmann (born 26 January 1973) is the founder and leader of the Pegida movement, a far-right German political organisation linked to the anti-Muslim counter-jihad ideology. As leader of Pegida, Bachmann has led marches of tens of thousands of people against Muslim immigration. Bachmann has a long history of criminal convictions, and was banned from entering the United Kingdom in 2018. Born in 1973 in Dresden , East Germany , Bachmann had
134-728: A Deutsche Welle report from December 2014, Pegida considers Islamism a misogynist and violent ideology. In January 2015 The Guardian described Pegida as a far-right movement, The New York Times labelled Pegida as anti-immigrant , and Angela Merkel has repeatedly questioned the motives underlying its anti-immigrant message. The State Authority for the Protection of the Constitution ( German : Landesamt für Verfassungsschutz ) of Thuringia considers Sügida (the regional Pegida branch of South Thuringia) to be steered by right-wing nationalists. In February 2015
201-466: A Taliban beard" ( "Moslemfritzen mit Talibanbart" ), who had as much to do with German culture as "my asshole with the production of perfume" ( "wie mein Arschloch mit Parfümherstellung" ). However, the most-widely spread quote from Pirinçci's 19 October speech was, "Unfortunately, the concentration camps are out of order at the moment!" ( "Aber die KZs sind ja leider derzeit außer Betrieb!" ), which
268-584: A fugitive , he opened a nightclub in Cape Town which catered to black people . This was not long after the end of apartheid , and Bachmann says, "It was scandalous. People were shouting at me, 'How can you do this as a German, as a white? How can you open a night club for blacks?'" Bachmann says, "I became a refugee. But a refugee from German law". Bachmann is the owner of a public relations and advertising company in Dresden that he founded in 1992, and has been
335-801: A publicist for nightclubs . In January 2014, Bachmann was one of 500 helpers, who was awarded the Saxon Flood Helper Order at a public event by Dresden's Lord Mayor Helma Orosz on behalf of the Saxon Prime Minister Stanislaw Tillich . During the 2013 floods , he had organised the Flood Aid Centre in the former Glücksgas Stadium and collected aid and donations. Bachmann started Pegida in October 2014 to protest plans to add 14 refugee centres in Dresden, Germany. Through Pegida he rallied
402-546: A survey by the Emnid institute conducted in December 2014, 53% of East Germans and 48% of West Germans showed understanding for Pegida demonstrations. Differentiated by political parties, supporters consisted of 86% of all surveyed AfD members, 54% of all CDU members, 46% of all SPD members and 19% of all questioned supporters of The Left and Alliance '90/The Greens respectively. 43% of all Germans participating in
469-452: A working-class upbringing. Time reports that he is the son of a butcher. He was a chef and graphic designer , and played professional soccer for teams in Dresden and Düsseldorf . Bachmann has a criminal record for sixteen burglaries , dealing cocaine and assault. In 1998, after Bachmann had been sentenced to several years in prison, he fled to South Africa but was deported back to Germany. According to Bachmann, during his time as
536-453: A "mentally sick, manic queer with a screw loose" ( "geisteskranken, durchgeknallten Schwulen mit Dachschaden" ). Pirinçci had also described the professor's theories as a "jewel of stupidity" ( "Juwel der Doofheit" ). At the first anniversary of the Pegida protests in Dresden on 19 October 2015, Pirinçci was invited as keynote speaker. He accused German politicians of being " Gauleiter against their own people" and called Germany's government
603-533: A "shit state" ( "Scheißstaat" ). Further, according to Pirinçci, Muslims want to "pump infidels full of their Muslim juice" ( "Ungläubige mit ihrem Moslemsaft vollpumpen" ) and stated that Germany is becoming a "Muslim garbage dump" ( "Moslemmüllhalde" ). He called the German Green Party a "Party of child fuckers " ( "Kinderfickerpartei" ), and the spokesperson for the mosque in Erfurt a "Muslim guy with
670-446: A 19 October 2015 rally in Dresden. At the same time, observers perceived a further radicalisation of the crowd. On 28 September, two journalists were injured when Pegida participants kicked a local newspaper reporter and punched another TV reporter in the face. On 12 October, Pegida demonstrators carried a mock gallows showing nooses reserved for Chancellor Angela Merkel and her deputy Sigmar Gabriel . Bachmann derided
737-519: A Pegida march, the floodlights of the Catholic Cologne Cathedral were switched off on the evening of 5 January 2015. Dresden's Volkswagen plant used the same method of protest. German tabloid newspaper Bild launched a petition against Pegida, including former Chancellors Helmut Schmidt and Gerhard Schröder , as well as actress Karoline Herfurth and former footballer Oliver Bierhoff . According to
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#1732787303866804-489: A dialogue, considering the press to be a politically correct conspiracy. Demonstrators have been observed chanting Lügenpresse (lying press), a term that has a long history in German politics. Alongside the German national flag, supporters of the movement have often been seen with a variant of the " Wirmer flag ", a flag proposed by resistance member Josef Wirmer in 1944 for use after World War II. According to
871-454: A handful of people. During the following days, the movement began gaining wider public attention, and, subsequently, the weekly Monday demonstrations drew larger numbers of people. Among the 7,500 participants on 1 December 2014, the police identified 80 to 120 hooligans . The demonstration grew to 10,000 people on 8 December 2014. During the weekly demonstrations on Monday evenings, Pegida supporters carried banners with slogans such as "For
938-518: A leadership member, and "his execution had been ordered by ISIS terrorists". On 21 January 2015, Bachmann resigned from his position in Pegida after coming under fire for a number of Facebook posts. Excerpts from a closed Facebook conversation incriminated Bachmann as having referred to immigrants with the insults "animals", "scumbags" and "trash", which are classified as hate speech in Germany. He
1005-431: A licence and even dealing in cocaine ". In 1998 he fled to South Africa to avoid German justice, but was finally extradited and served his two-year jail sentence. Akif Pirin%C3%A7ci Akif Pirinçci ( Turkish pronunciation: [aːˈcif piɾintʃˈdʒi] ; born 20 October 1959) is a Turkish-born German writer who is best known internationally for his novel Felidae . After a highly controversial speech for
1072-545: A movement of right-wing extremists, pensioners or the unemployed, but stated that the rallies served as a way to express feelings and resentments against a political and opinion-making elite which have not been publicly articulated before. A group of social scientists led by Dieter Rucht from the Social Science Research Centre of Berlin ( Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung , WZB ) collected data both by flyer and online survey. Despite
1139-458: A mustache and hair style similar to Adolf Hitler . According to Bachmann, it was an old photo that was meant as a joke. After the photo sparked international outrage, Bachmann stepped down as de facto leader of Pegida. According to Bachmann and Pegida co-founder Kathrin Oertel, Bachmann's resignation had nothing to do with the photo. A few weeks later, Bachmann was reinstated as a co-leader following
1206-572: A new political party, the Freiheitlich Direktdemokratische Volkspartei ("Liberal Direct Democratic People's Party", or FDDV ). The FDDV was established on 13 June 2016. Tommy Robinson founded a branch of Pegida in the United Kingdom . At the beginning of December 2014, Pegida published an undated and anonymous one-page manifesto of 19 bulleted position statements. Pegida's specific demands were initially unclear, largely because Pegida has refused
1273-657: A participation rate of only 18 percent in the online survey, it largely had similar results to the survey in Dresden. According to data from the WZB, Pegida was a male-dominated group, participants were mostly employees with a relatively high level of education, they had no confidence in institutions and they sympathised with AfD . In some cases the participants demonstrated far-right and right-wing extremist attitudes. The conclusion emphasised that Pegida supporters cannot be viewed as 'ordinary citizens', since they articulate group-focused enmity and racism. As of January 2016 on Facebook,
1340-663: A penalty order from the Dresden District Court for sedition and violations of the Assembly Act. Bachmann had published a speech by Akif Pirinçci on the internet, for which Pirinçci was later convicted. The same month, the State Criminal Police Office of Berlin took up investigations against Bachmann for slander, false suspicion and incitement, because Bachmann had made false claims regarding Keira G. murder case . Bachmann had posted
1407-453: A photo of a man wearing the uniform of the US white supremacist organisation Ku Klux Klan accompanied by the slogan: "Three Ks a day keeps the minorities away". The Dresden state prosecutors opened an investigation for suspected Volksverhetzung (incitement to hatred), and Deputy Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel said the real face of Pegida had been exposed: "Anyone who puts on a Hitler disguise
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#17327873038661474-546: A sizable number of ordinary citizens". Werner Schiffauer , director of the Migration Council, has pointed out that the movement is strongest where people have hardly any experience with foreigners, and among "easterners who never really arrived in the Federal Republic and who now feel they have no voice". In December, Gordian Meyer-Plath , president of Saxony's State Authority for the Protection of
1541-663: A speech at the Speakers' Corner in London , but was rejected by the British authorities at the London Stansted Airport where he was taken into custody by British authorities, and taken to a deportation facility and flown back to Germany a little later. The British authorities justified the deportation notice with the concern for the public good and Bachmann's criminal record for drug trafficking. He then announced in
1608-765: A video message that the speech he wanted to hold was that of the head of the Austrian Identitarian movement , Martin Sellner . Sellner had also been refused entry a few days earlier. Bachmann then read the Sellner speech in Dresden on a Pegida Monday demonstration. For the insult of a journalist in August 2019, Bachmann was sentenced to 60 daily rates by the District Court of Dresden in February 2020. Because Bachmann had published an arrest warrant, he
1675-423: A vote. The Sächsische Zeitung later reported that the moustache was added after the photo was taken, with Bachmann asserting that it was a "forgery". In 2016, Bachmann was charged with incitement of racial hatred. The charges were laid after someone using a Facebook page with Lutz Bachmann's name called refugees "cattle," "scumbags," and "filth" in a Facebook post in 2014. The first day of Bachmann's trial, which
1742-413: A young Eritrean immigrant, Khaled Idris Bahray , was found stabbed to death in his Dresden high-rise apartment. International media correspondents portrayed an "atmosphere of hatred and resentment" and published social media comments of Pegida sympathizers, who had expressed disdain for the dead Eritrean. Pegida's organizers rejected any possible connection. One week later, the police investigation led to
1809-415: Is a pan-European , anti-Islam , far-right extremist political movement. German Pegida believes that Germany is being increasingly Islamicised. Pegida wants to curb immigration into Germany and it accuses the authorities of failure to enforce related laws. Pegida has held many demonstrations, often accompanied by counter-demonstrations. In 2015, Lutz Bachmann , the founder of Pegida, resigned from
1876-551: Is either an idiot or a Nazi. People should think carefully about running after a pied piper like this". Der Spiegel reported that Pegida's media spokeswoman, Kathrin Oertel , turned to the Alternative for Germany ( German : Alternative für Deutschland, AfD ) for advice, and that the Sächsische Zeitung and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung both confirmed there was a phone conversation between
1943-649: The Bertelsmann Foundation , complemented by a TNS Emnid survey from November 2014, showed that a majority of German citizens considered Islam dangerous. Consequently, there seemed to be a "strong sympathy" for "Pegida slogans". In absolute numbers, 57% of all surveyed thought of Islam as a danger. 40% felt like "foreigners in their own country", while 24% stated that they would like to prevent further Muslim immigration. These opinions were not exclusive to any political camps or social classes . Former chancellor Angela Merkel criticised Pegida, saying that
2010-540: The Forsa Institute conducted a survey which showed that 67% of all surveyed Germans considered the danger of Islamisation exaggerated. 29%, consisting of 71% of all surveyed AfD supporters, felt too strong an Islamic influence in Germany and deemed respective demonstrations justified. 13% said they would participate in protests near their residence. 10%, consisting of 57% of all surveyed AfD followers, would even vote for an anti-Islamic party. A special report by
2077-594: The German Defence League or the European Identitarian movement . In a Tagesspiegel interview on 19 January, Meyer-Plath reaffirmed that the participant spectrum was very diverse and that there was no evidence of radicalisation. Dresden University of Technology (TU) interviewed 400 Pegida demonstrators on 22 December 2014 and 12 January 2015. According to the poll, the main reasons of their participation were dissatisfaction with
Lutz Bachmann - Misplaced Pages Continue
2144-586: The Occident '). On 7 October, Yazidis and Muslim Chechens had violently clashed in Celle . On 26 October, out of 5,000 protesters, "at least 400 right-wing extremists went on a rampage in downtown Cologne during a demonstration" by " Hooligans Against Salafists ". Bachmann mentioned these events in a release for his first demonstration. The first demonstration, or "evening stroll" (according to Pegida), took place on 20 October 2014, and attracted only
2211-620: The Pegida movement in 2015, he had his contracts cancelled and works delisted by his publishers, Amazon and most booksellers in Germany. While writing and publishing these non-fiction essays, Pirinçci also increasingly came in contact with functionaries of the anti-Islamic movement Pegida , the right-wing populist party Alternative for Germany , and the small right-wing German Freedom Party , who organized lecture tours where Pirinçci would read from his two political essay books. When he faced criticism in May 2014, he justified these contacts by telling
2278-539: The 19 positions were revised and broken down to the ten "Theses of Dresden". On 10 September 2015, Pegida demanded ten changes to the German refugee policy. They called for an immediate stop for asylum seekers and for a German 'asylum-emergency law'. According to Frank Richter, director of Saxony's Federal Agency for Civic Education , Pegida is "a mixed group—known figures from the National Democratic Party of Germany , soccer hooligans, but also
2345-665: The AfD's Frauke Petry and Oertel . Petry said to Oertel that Bachmann should no longer be supported (" Ich habe ihr gesagt, dass Bachmann nicht mehr zu halten ist "). On that same day Oertel announced Bachmann 's resignation. On 28 January, Oertel resigned as well, citing "the massive hostility, threats and career disadvantages" as the reason. At the same time four other leading figures of Pegida stepped back. On 2 February 2015 Oertel and six other former Pegida members founded Direkte Demokratie für Europa ('Direct Democracy for Europe') to distance themselves from
2412-493: The Constitution , said that initial suspicion that Pegida might tie in with the riots staged by Hogesa earlier in Cologne were not substantiated, so the movement was not put under official surveillance. He said there were no indications that the organizers were embracing right-wingers. This assessment was contested by the weekly Die Zeit who researched the ideological proximity of Pegida organizer Siegfried Däbritz to
2479-636: The Pegida fan page had about 200,000 supporters. According to political consultant Martin Fuchs , the fanpage allows the users there to present and more easily spread their ideas, which are not represented in the mainstream media. In December 2014, representatives of the NPD encouraged people to participate in Pegida rallies, as did the German Defence League and the internet blog Politically Incorrect in an uploaded 'propaganda clip'. According to
2546-428: The arrest and eventual conviction of one of the victim's Eritrean housemates. Dresden police did not permit the demonstration planned for 19 January 2015, due to a definite threat against one of Pegida's leadership members in form of an Arabic-language tweet labelling Pegida an "enemy of Islam". Pegida cancelled its 13th demonstration and stated in a post on its Facebook page that there was an explicit threat against
2613-780: The country. Addressing the crowd shouting "Resistance!", he claimed that the majority of Germans were held in contempt by the political class and that politicians wished that there were "other alternatives [to fight Pegida supporters ] – but the concentration camps are unfortunately out of order at the moment". The crowd applauded and laughed, and let him continue his speech for another 20 minutes before calling upon him to finish. When 1,500 to 2,000 people celebrated Pegida in Leipzig 's first anniversary, dozens of hooligans protested, vandalizing foreign-owned shops. Over 100 people were arrested. Mayor Burkhard Jung called it "open street terror". The founder of Pegida, Lutz Bachmann , has set up
2680-620: The demonstrators who made it, calling it a "laughable piece of work with spelling errors" (" lächerliche Bastelarbeit mit Schreibfehlern "), a reference to the fact that the name Sigmar had been written with an "ie" ( Siegmar ). At Pegida's anniversary event on 19 October 2015, keynote speaker Akif Pirinçci named the Muslim refugees as invaders, with Germany becoming a "Muslim garbage dump". Pirinçci said that politicians were acting like " Gauleiter against their own people", as they wanted critics of Germany's refugee policy to leave
2747-464: The disparate forces of the German right against the "parallel societies" of Muslims in Europe. Bachmann publicly renounces extremist violence of any kind and insists his enemy is not religion itself. As a result of his involvement with Pegida he has been threatened with death and had to cancel a march in Dresden. In mid-January 2015, Bachmann was criticised after a photograph surfaced showing him with
Lutz Bachmann - Misplaced Pages Continue
2814-546: The far-right tendencies of Pegida. In February 2015, Pegida confirmed on its Facebook page that Lutz Bachmann had been re-elected as chairman by the six other members of the organisation's leadership committee, after the Sächsische Zeitung published a report that the Hitler moustache on the now infamous photo had been added after the photo was taken. In June 2015, following the resignation of CDU incumbent Helma Orosz on health grounds, Tatjana Festerling , who
2881-508: The internet would constitute evidence. On 3 May 2016, Bachmann was convicted of "inciting racial hatred" and fined €9,600. Both the defence as well the prosecution were planning on appealing against the ruling. In October 2016, Lutz Bachmann moved to live in the south of Tenerife where he was declared persona non grata by the authorities of that island. Bachmann has set up the new party Liberal Direct Democratic People's Party ( Freiheitlich Direktdemokratische Volkspartei , FDDV). The party
2948-476: The leaders of Pegida "have prejudice, coldness, even hatred in their hearts". The Federal Minister of the Interior Thomas de Maizière said that among the participants of the mass rallies were many ordinary people who expressed their concerns about the challenges of today's society. Bernd Lucke , the leader of the political party Alliance for Progress and Renewal , has said he considers most of
3015-476: The movement after a doctored photographed appeared where he appeared to be posing as Adolf Hitler and making racist statements on Facebook. He was later reinstated. Though nationalism is a central feature, Pegida offshoots have formed in various countries. It is a grassroots part of the counter-jihad movement . Pegida was founded in October 2014 by Lutz Bachmann , who runs a public relations agency in Dresden . Bachmann 's impetus for starting Pegida
3082-426: The online blog of the newspaper Die Zeit "I don't give a flying fuck if people call me a Nazi, I don't give a damn." ( "Es geht mir am Arsch vorbei, wenn man mich einen Nazi nennt, das ist mir scheißegal" ). On 20 January 2015, the local paper General-Anzeiger reported that Pirinçci had been found liable for defamation in a civil suit brought by a professor of sociology and biology, whom Pirinçci had described as
3149-789: The opposite. 26% approved at least partially of the demonstrations, while 10% showed little sympathy and a further 13% no understanding at all. A survey by TNS Infratest conducted in December 2014 on behalf of German magazine Der Spiegel showed that 65% of all surveyed German citizens felt that the government did not respond appropriately to their concerns about asylum policy and immigration. 28% disagreed, while 34% observed an increasing Islamisation in Germany. A representative survey by Emnid conducted from 17 to 18 December 2014 showed that 85% of all 1006 surveyed were not willing to participate in demonstrations for Pegida policy. Only 9%, more than half of all surveyed AfD followers, said they were in fact willing to demonstrate. On 18 December 2014,
3216-450: The photo of an innocent young Muslim man with a migration background due to a chance name resemblance on Facebook and accused him offender. The real suspect, an ethnic German, was already in pre-trial detention at that time. The Berlin police warned on the internet against false suspicion in the case of Keira. Bachmann defended himself by simply making an assumption and did not make any factual claims. A few days later, Bachmann wanted to hold
3283-539: The police, a few hundred "violent hooligans" have been participating in the Dresden rallies since December 2014. The journalist Felix Menzel supports Pegida with his new right youth magazine Blaue Narzisse . Numerous protests against Pegida and affiliated movements in cities across Germany have drawn up to 35,000 demonstrators in Dresden and up to 100,000 nationwide in January 2015, considerably more than Pegida's own concurrent demonstrations. In protest against
3350-445: The political situation (54 percent), "Islam, Islamism and Islamisation" (23 percent), criticism of the media and the public (20 percent), and reservations regarding asylum seekers and migrants (15 percent). In all, 42 percent had reservations regarding Muslims or Islam, 20 percent were concerned about a 'high rate of crimes' committed by asylum seekers, or feared socio-economic disadvantages. The author, Vorländer , did not see Pegida as
3417-465: The positions of Pegida to be legitimate. According to Lucke , the people taking part in these demonstrations did not feel that their concerns were being understood by politicians. Similarly, the Dresden city council's AfD faction welcomed Pegida's weekly demonstrations. Josef Schuster , chairman of the Central Council of Jews in Germany , voiced his opposition to the group, saying that
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#17327873038663484-518: The possibility of an Islamic conquest of Germany would be as "absurd" as a resurrection of the Nazi regime . Schuster described Pegida as being "highly dangerous": "It starts with verbal assault and leads to actual attacks like the one on a planned refugee hostel in Bavaria". He referred to an arson attack on a home for asylum-seekers that was ready for occupation. After the attack, swastika graffiti
3551-407: The preservation of our culture", "Against religious fanaticism, against any kind of radicalism, together without violence" and "Against religious wars on German soil". On 19 December 2014, PEGIDA e.V. was legally registered in Dresden under the registration ID VR 7750 , with Bachmann as chairman, Rene Jahn as vice-chairman and Kathrin Oertel as treasurer. Pegida also formally applied for
3618-482: The public the false impression of a racist Germany. The slogans of the protesters showed that xenophobia and anti-Semitic racism had become socially acceptable. Pegida has been criticised by Lutheran clergy, including the Bishop of Hamburg Kirsten Fehrs . Bachmann 's credibility as a leader has been criticised because he has numerous criminal convictions, including "16 burglaries, drink-driving or driving without
3685-634: The status of a nonprofit organization . While the demonstration on 29 December 2014 was cancelled by the organizers, the movement continued to draw large numbers of participants in early January 2015. After the Charlie Hebdo shooting on 7 January 2015 in Paris, politicians (including ministers Thomas de Maizière and Heiko Maas ) warned Pegida against misusing the attack on Charlie Hebdo for its own political agenda. On Saturday 10 January 2015 some 35,000 anti-Pegida protesters gathered to mourn
3752-431: The survey thought that Pegida protesters are mainly concerned about the "spread of Islam". 33% believed that mainly right wing extremists attend their demonstrations. On behalf of German newspaper Die Zeit , YouGov conducted a survey from 12 to 15 December 2014. The survey showed that 30% of all 1107 surveyed felt sympathetic with regards to the demonstrations. Another 19% said they were understanding rather than
3819-504: The victims of Paris, observing a minute's silence in front of the Frauenkirche . On 12 January 2015, Pegida organizers organised a rally of some 25,000 participants. Pegida's main organizer, Bachmann , declared the six central political objectives of Pegida, which include calls for selective immigration and the expulsion of religious extremists, the right and duty to integrate, and tighter internal security. On 15 January 2015,
3886-460: The webmaster to his online blog also cancelled Pirinçci's contract. At the same time, Amazon Germany chose to de-list his books so they can't be found through searches or ordered through the website. A few days later, all relevant book wholesalers in Germany (Libri, Umbreit, and KNV) also stopped ordering his books, and many independent bookstores issued statements that they would refuse to order his books, even upon request. This reaction by bookstores
3953-477: Was also quoted as commenting that extra security was needed at the welfare office "to protect employees from the animals". A self-portrait of Bachmann allegedly posing as a reincarnation of Adolf Hitler , titled "He's back!" (which the Sächsische Zeitung later discovered to be a forgery, reporting that the moustache was added after the photo was taken), went viral on social media and was printed on front pages worldwide. On another occasion, Bachmann had posted
4020-568: Was criticized by columnist Jan Fleischhauer in Der Spiegel as amounting to authoritarian censorship. Volker Beck , member of parliament for the German Green Party, filed charges against Pirinçci for public incitement to commit criminal acts and incitement to hatred . A spokesperson for the federal prosecutor's office confirmed that an investigation is ongoing. Two weeks after his Pegida speech, Pirinçci told Der Spiegel that
4087-471: Was dismissed from Pegida's leadership circle in June 2016, ran for the mayoral office of Dresden, polling 9.6% in the first round with support from the far-right National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD). On 7 July 2015, Bachmann announced that Pegida would participate in all future federal elections in Germany. The European migrant crisis revived the movement, which drew as many as 20,000 supporters to
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#17327873038664154-626: Was established on 13 June 2016. In January 2017, Bachmann had to answer to the Dresden Regional Court because an aid organisation had sued him due to reputational damage. In a Facebook entry of November 2016, Bachmann had described the aid organisation, which collected donations for the purchase of a ship that was to participate in rescue missions in the Mediterranean, as a "criminally acting private smuggling organisation" and as "law breakers". In March 2018, Bachmann received
4221-436: Was found at the scene. Schuster said that Pegida is a combination of "neo-Nazis, far-right parties and citizens who think they are finally allowed to show their racism and xenophobia openly". He condemned the movement, stating that the fear of Islamist terror was being exploited to disparage an entire religion. Aiman Mazyek from the Central Council of Muslims in Germany stated that again and again right-wing extremists gave
4288-561: Was met with applause from the crowd. In a wider context, Pirinçci's concentration camps statement was intended to accuse critics of Pegida of intending to send Pegida members to said concentration camps. Pirinçci's remarks were apparently deemed too offensive by the crowd, and was booed off the stage. Within 24 hours after first quotes from Pirinçci's Pegida speech appeared in the media, his publishers Goldmann and Random House issued statements that they had cancelled their contracts with Pirinçci and would no longer sell any of his books, and
4355-470: Was originally planned on being split into three separate days, took place on 19 April 2016. Bachmann's lawyer, Katja Reichel, argued that there are hundreds of Facebook pages with the name Lutz Bachmann on Facebook, and that there was no reason to believe that the Lutz Bachmann being accused was the one who made these comments. State attorney Tobias Uhlemann has pointed out that nothing originating from
4422-684: Was sentenced to 100 daily rates of 30 euros by the district court of Dippoldiswalde, then appealed, but withdrew it in August 2020, thus being finalised. In April 2022, Bachmann was convicted of insulting and sedition. The Dresden Regional Court imposed a six-month prison sentence, which was suspended for two years. Pegida Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West ( German : Patriotische Europäer gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes ), abbreviated Pegida ( German: [peˈɡiːda] , stylised in its logo as PEGIDA ),
4489-589: Was witnessing a rally by alleged supporters of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) against the siege of Kobani by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) on 10 October 2014 in Dresden, which he posted on YouTube on the same day. The next day he founded a Facebook group called Patriotische Europäer Gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes ('Patriotic Europeans against Islamisation of
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