Some 800 German police officers in the German states Bremen, Hamburg and Lower Saxony raided several apartments and offices connected to a human trafficking ring late on Monday and in the early hours of Tuesday morning.

According to local media reports, three men were arrested — two Germans and a Russian national — on suspicion of smuggling Moldovan citizens into Germany on fake Romanian passports and employing them in security services.

Read more: Combating human traffickers - facts and questions

Police said they had been investigating the smugglers since October last year. At least five other people are believed to be part of the trafficking network, including an Austrian family that reportedly owns the security firm that illegally employed the trafficked Moldovans.

Watch video 06:13 Moldova – Nowhere between East and West # 09.08.2010 # Global 3000

The company had allegedly won contracts to supply security services to Hamburg's ports, a number of constructions sites and even homes for asylum seekers.

Connections to the Reichsbürger

Reports also suggested that police found evidence linking at least one of the traffickers, the accountant for the security firm, to the far-right Reichsbürger movement. The accountant's ex-husband and son reportedly run the security company. According to local media, the accountant — whose office was raided overnight on Monday — is currently living with a former officer from Germany's special SEK police unit.

The term Reichsbürger, which roughly translates as "Citizens of the Reich," is used as a label for a loosely connected group that rejects the legitimacy of Germany's federal government. Its followers believe that the 1937 borders of the German Empire still exist and that today's Germany is an administrative construct in a country still occupied by foreign powers. Many also subscribe to far-right or anti-Semitic ideologies.

German authorities estimate that some 18,000 people subscribe to the movement, around 1,000 of whom identify with extreme right-wing ideology.

The threat posed by the group has become increasingly prominent since late 2016, after one of its members in Bavaria opened fire on a group of police officers during a raid, killing one.

Read more: A guide to Germany's far-right groups

Probes into the far-right have since uncovered a handful of public servants who identify with the movement, including four civil servants in the state of Hesse, three police officers in Saxony and a policeman in Bavaria.

The Reichsbürger movement in Germany What do Reichsbürger believe? "Reichsbürger" translates to "citizens of the Reich." The nebulous movement rejects the modern German state, and insists that the German Empire's 1937 or 1871 borders still exist and the modern country is an administrative construct still occupied by Allied powers. For Reichsbürger, the government, parliament, judiciary and security agencies are puppets installed and controlled by foreigners.

The Reichsbürger movement in Germany What do they do? The Reichsbürger refuse to pay taxes or fines. They see their personal property, such as their houses, as independent entities outside the authority of the Federal Republic of Germany, and reject the German constitution and other legal texts, but also swamp German courts with lawsuits. They produce their own aspirational documents such as passports and driving licenses.

The Reichsbürger movement in Germany How much of a threat are they? The Reichsbürger scene began to develop in the 1980s and is a disparate, leaderless movement that has grown to about 19,000 supporters, according to German intelligence officials. Of those, about 950 have been identified as far-right extremists and at least 1,000 have a license to own firearms. Many subscribe to anti-Semitic ideologies.

The Reichsbürger movement in Germany Who are its members? One was Mr. Germany According to German authorities, the average Reichsbürger is 50 years old, male, and is socially and financially disadvantaged. The movement's members are concentrated in the southern and eastern parts of Germany. Adrian Ursache, a former winner of the Mister Germany beauty pageant, is also a Reichsbürger and was sentenced to seven years in prison in 2019 for shooting and injuring a policeman.

The Reichsbürger movement in Germany Turning point The case of Wolfgang P., who in October 2017 was sentenced to life in prison for murdering a police officer, is seen as a turning point for how German authorities deal with the extremist group. P., an alleged Reichsbürger member, shot at officers who were raiding his home to confiscate weapons. The case gained international attention and set off alarm bells over the escalation of violence.

The Reichsbürger movement in Germany What are the authorities doing about it? German authorities were accused of long underestimating the threat. In 2017 for the first time Germany’s domestic intelligence service documented extremist crimes perpetrated by individual Reichsbürger. Since then there have been several raids on Reichsbürger targets and subgroups have been banned. Police and military have also probed whether they have Reichsbürger in their own ranks.

The Reichsbürger movement in Germany International parallels, conspiracy theories Reichsbürger have been seen waving Russian flags, leading to allegations that they are funded by Russia with the aim to destabilize the German government. Germany's Reichsbürger are also compared to US groups such as "freemen-on-the-land," who believe that they are bound only by laws they consent to and can therefore declare themselves independent of the government and the rule of law. Author: Samantha Early, Rina Goldenberg



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dm/jm (dpa, AFP, Reuters)