NEWS FROM BERLIN

Car ban in Berlin put on the brakes

The initiative “Volksentscheid Berlin Autofrei” (Berlin Car Free Referendum), which seeks for a ban on cars within Berlin’s S-Bahn ring, seems to have lost its current round: the way to a referendum was blocked by the Senate for the time being. For one thing, Berlin’s interior administration considers the draft law submitted for review to be inadmissible. Besides, the transport administration under Senator Bettina Jarasch (Greens) reflects it as politically unsocial. “We need car-free neighbourhoods and green oases, but not a car-free inner city,” Jarasch stressed. Source: nd.

The street that doesn’t interest anyone

For a long time, drawings and old telephones as audio guides about GDR times could be admired in the “Café Sibylle”, on Karl-Marx-Allee. But what can be seen there today since its reopening in 2018 has little to do with that. Achim Bahr, the chairman of the non-profit association Stalinbauten campaigns for the preservation of the cultural heritage along Karl-Marx-Allee, is more than disappointed with the current situation. For the Corbusier House and the Hansa Quarter, which also apply for cultural heritage status, there are rooms for exhibitions and information. On Karl-Marx-Allee, however, there is nothing similar to this. Source: nd.

NEWS FROM GERMANY

Baerbock speaks out in favour of NATO expansion

The 30 NATO foreign ministers are in Berlin to discuss the Ukraine war and the admission of new members. Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (“die Grünen”) has held out the prospect of Sweden and Finland quickly joining NATO. The German government has already held talks with “all democratic parties”. According to Baerbock, numerous other NATO countries have also promised a rapid ratification process, too. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on the other hand, has said Scandinavian countries were virtually “guest houses for terrorist organisations”. As expected, the enlargement plans have been met with rejection in Moscow. Source: DW.

Prosecutor demands five years in prison for 101-year-old defendant

In the trial of an alleged former guard of Sachsenhausen concentration camp, the prosecution demanded a five-year prison sentence for the 101-year-old accused. There is no doubt that Josef S. worked as an SS man in Sachsenhausen, said prosecutor Cyrill Klement. The accused had not only put up with the conditions in the camp, but had even made a career there, Klement added. He did not take the opportunity to be transferred to the front, either. The prosecution accuses Josef S. of aiding and abetting cruel and insidious murder in more than 3,500 cases. Source: rbb.

Former chancellor to be given up

The office of former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder is to be officially given up. This is what the budget committee of the Bundestag wants to decide in its session on Thursday. Although terms like “Putin”, “Russia” or “Gazprom” do not come up, Schröder has been criticised for his closeness to Russian President. Instead, the liquidation is justified by the fact that “former Chancellor Schröder no longer has any continuing obligations from office.” The staff remaining in the office should wind up the office. The posts would not be filled after 19 May, and the holders would take on other duties outside the office. Source: taz.

Meat consumption is the problem

The German government wants to reduce the use of biofuels, which is long overdue. At a time when food shortages are looming worldwide, it is not justifiable to ferment grain into biofuel instead of feeding people with it. However, such debate ignores the place where the most food is wasted: the trough. Of the grain grown in Germany, about 20 per cent ends up directly on the plate, just under 10 per cent becomes fuel, and almost 60 per cent is used as animal feed. In the end, the animals fed with it also serve human nutrition. But direct use would feed many more people. Source: taz

Victory Day in Treptower Park

Usually, on every May 9, at S-Bahnhof Treptower Park, one could see Russian-speaking groups because of the Victory Day celebrations. This year, however, any celebration of “Russian” victory has shown another significance. For instance, police dressed in black lined both sides of the large stone arches which mark the entrance to the Soviet memorial. Visitors being checked for any forbidden items. Besides, the Berlin government has not only banned the controversial ‘Z’ symbol, but both the Russian and Ukrainian flags, that of the Soviet Union, and the ribbon of St George, all of that, to avoid provocations. Source: Exberliner.

Berlin considers referendum for car-free city centre not feasible

The planned referendum for a car-free inner city is inadmissible according to the Berlin Senate. It is incompatible with the constitution of Berlin, according to a statement by the interior administration. The draft law, which would ban private car traffic in the area within the S-Bahn ring, is disproportionate, explained the spokesperson of the interior administration, Sylvia Schwab. The alliance “Volksentscheid Berlin autofrei” reacted indignantly against that. Anyhow, the transport administration will now prepare a proposal for a resolution. The Senate must decide on its position on the petition within the next two weeks. Source: rbb24.

NEWS FROM BERLIN

Grunewald comes under the wheel

On the day before May Day, a hotel was temporarily occupied to turn it into housing for refugees, and in the evening, the queerfeminist Take-Back-The-Night-Demo militantly marched through Prenzlauer Berg and Mitte. On Sunday morning, May 1, there was a bicycle demo in Grünewald, which sees itself as a “discursive gateway drug into dealing with the class question”. There was a public festival with a programme ranging from anarchist yodelling music to expropriation beatbox. The blinds of the surrounding villas were mostly drawn. But individual residents waved in a friendly manner. In other parts of the city such as Friedrichshain’s Laskerkiez speeches occurred against income concentration, too. Source: taz.

NEWS FROM GERMANY

Income differences between men and women remain extreme

According to a study commissioned by the Bertelsmann Foundation, women can only earn slightly more than half as much gross income as men over their entire working lives. And this so-called gender lifetime earnings gap is much larger when children are involved. On average, married mothers and fathers in their mid-30s today have around 700,000 euros each in their prime working years – i.e. between 20 and 55 – after taxes and contributions plus transfers and family benefits. According to the study, women who are predominantly single mothers have only about 520,000 euros at their disposal. Source: Spiegel.

Social workers and educators strike for higher wages

The service sector union ver.di has again called on workers in social and educational professions to go on warning strikes across the country. Workers are set to walk off the job on several days, each day striking in a different area. On Monday, social work workers have started, followed on Wednesday by day-care centres and all-day schools, and on Thursday, a strike was planned by staff working in assistance for people with disabilities. The reason for the strikes is that collective bargaining for the approximately 330,000 workers in the sector failed to reach a result in the second round at the end of March. Source: Zeit.

Death by police violence

In Mannheim on last Monday, an apparently mentally ill man was seriously injured during an arrest by two police officers. The 47-year-old died a short time later. On a video that went viral, one of the officers can be seen hitting the man’s head. In the only 40 second-long video, it is possible there to hear the man shouting, “I want a judge.” After a cut in the video, he is seen lying lifeless on his back with a bleeding wound on his face. A second video shows how one of the officers previously used pepper spray and the two ran after the man. Source: jW.

One in five has been affected by racism

The new “National Racism Monitor” (rassismusmonitor.de) shows with a representative survey, where almost half of the people in Germany have already observed racist incidents. And 22 per cent – a fifth of the population, have even been affected themselves. The study will be continued in the coming years. The study by the German Centre for Integration and Migration Research (Dezim) shows that young people report direct experiences of racism more often than older people, too. This could be related to a heightened awareness of the problem. The researchers also concluded criticism of racism is often warded off by assuming that those affected are hypersensitive. Source: rbb24.

Climate protection “with a sense of proportion”

The A14 motorway may continue to be built, and the state of Saxony-Anhalt does not have to make any improvements in terms of climate protection. This was announced by the Federal Administrative Court in Leipzig. Thus, the Naturefriends of Saxony-Anhalt lost their lawsuit against the State Administrative Office concerning the traffic section 2.2 of the expansion project between Osterburg and Seehausen. For the Friends of Nature, the reason for the lawsuit was considerable inadequacies in the planning. Among other things, the association questioned the need for the motorway and criticized the violation of climate, species and water protection laws. Source: nd.

NEWS FROM BERLIN

“I don’t want to sexualise my breasts”

Gabrielle Lebreton is one of the first people to file a lawsuit in the sense of the Berlin State Anti-Discrimination Act (LADG). As an activist, she is now campaigning to show her breast in public without being sexualized. Last summer together with her six-year-old son, she lied topless on the lawn of the Plansche, in Treptow-Köpenick. The security staff of the district expelled her from the place. Therefore, Lebreton felt discriminated once men were allowed to be there topless, but she was not. The Berlin State Anti-Discrimination Act, from June 2020, aims to provide no one will be discriminated based on gender, ideology, disability, among other aspects. Source: rbb.

Voting rights in Berlin

In addition to electoral law reform on the federal level, organizations are primarily calling on the Senate to change the electoral law. This could mean for instance people without German citizenship would have the right to vote as long as they live permanently in Berlin. Also, Raed Saleh (SPD) and Sebastian Czaja (FDP) announced that the lowering of the voting age for the House of Representatives to 16, as agreed in the Red-Green-Red coalition agreement, might be enshrined in law this year. For this to happen, the constitution must be amended with a two-thirds majority. Source: nd.

House for the homeless to be demolished

After years of litigation, the Mitte district authority in Berlin wants to approve the demolition of the apartment buildings at Habersaatstraße 46 and 48. This is the result of a letter to the tenants signed by district mayor Stephan von Dassel (“die Grünen”). The initiative “Leerstand hab ich Saath” criticized the agreement of the district with the owner Arcadia Estate GmbH on Monday as “scandalous”. The district seems to approve the demolition under the following conditions: The remaining old tenants are to be given relocation flats and can live at their old rent for ten years or receiving 1,000 euros in compensation per square metre. Source: taz.

NEWS FROM GERMANY

“Die Linke” and patriarchy

The executive committee of the Left Party (“die Linke”) has published a resolution on how to deal with sexualized assaults in the party. The previous co-chair Susanne Hennig-Wellsow has already not participated in that meeting – because she resigned a few hours earlier. In her statement, she mentioned the “blatant deficits” in “dealing with sexism in our own ranks”. The remaining chairperson, Janine Wissler, should lead the party alone until a new election. However, Wissler may be involved in the LeftMeToo scandal, which became public at the end of last week through a “Spiegel” investigation. Source: nd.

Baerbock and her visit to the Baltic states

Before Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (“die Grünen”) took her flight home to Germany after three days of talks in the three Baltic states, she stopped by in Rukla. For five years now, the German Armed Forces have been leading one of the four NATO battlegroups in this Lithuanian town; for the first time since the Second World War, German soldiers are stationed there on former Soviet territory. The battlegroup is in a state of upheaval: after the Russian attack on Ukraine, it has already been increased to a good 1,500 soldiers, two-thirds of them German. Source: jW.

Freedom of expression for Israel boycott

The Stuttgart Palestine Committee is allowed again to announce events on the capital of Baden-Württenberg website. The committee is a civil society group, which campaigns for Palestinian rights and criticizes Israel as an “apartheid state”. For many years, the Committee was listed as a local initiative on the city website, therefore allowed to announce its events there. However, in 2018 a journalist from the Jerusalem Post criticized that, and the Committee’s access was impeded. When the Committee threatened a lawsuit in 2021, Stuttgart invoked its 2019 anti-discrimination declaration. Its Administrative Court (VG), though, understood the city’s website is a “public institution”, with access as other local organisations. Source: taz.