Raid against banned neo-Nazi sect "Artgemeinschaft" – 14 properties searched across five federal states
Three years after the ban on the far-right "Artgemeinschaft", police searched 14 properties across five federal states. There were no arrests.
Police search properties of alleged supporters of banned neo-Nazi sect
Three years after the ban on the far-right sect "Artgemeinschaft", the state has struck again. Since the early morning hours, police and state security officials have been searching 14 properties in Berlin, Brandenburg, Lower Saxony, North Rhine-Westphalia and Saxony-Anhalt. The searches target alleged members and sympathisers of the banned organisation. There were no arrests, though officers secured evidence.
According to BILD information, the raid was triggered by an investigation by the State Criminal Police Office of Saxony-Anhalt. Those under investigation are accused of participating in a summer solstice celebration in Saxony-Anhalt in June. Police in North Rhine-Westphalia searched a property in Lippstadt, and in Lower Saxony one in the municipality of Jameln. In Berlin, properties in Zehlendorf and Schöneberg were affected.
Der Spiegel previously reported on the operation and also that one of the searched properties in Saxony-Anhalt is allegedly the estate of AfD state parliament candidate Simon Lansmann in Gardelegen-Ipse. The summer solstice celebration is said to have taken place there in June, with several people from the sect's circle said to have been present.
"Artgemeinschaft" was founded in 1951 by former Nazi Wilhelm Kusserow and had been active since 1957 as a registered association based in Berlin. According to the Federal Agency for Civic Education, it is a "sect-like, religious-ethnic, anti-Christian and far-right organisation". The group saw itself as the preserver of a Nordic-Germanic race that was superior to other people, and demanded, for example, a "like-minded spouse selection" as a "guarantee for like-minded children".
The North Rhine-Westphalia Constitutional Protection Office described shortly before the 2023 ban that the group "directly drew on the racial doctrine of the Third Reich" and used a "neo-heathen ideological structure" as a vehicle to "disseminate far-right ideology for societal-political purposes". Despite the ban, the sect appears to remain active.
Source: BILD