There has been an “enormous rise” in the demand for self defence products including pepper spray in Germany as women react to the hundreds of sex crimes and assaults reported on New Year’s eve.

Faith in the ability of the state to protect ordinary citizens as they go about their legitimate business has clearly taken a knock since the migrant attacks, which seem to have been perpetrated in the main by recent migrants and Syrian refugees.

Shops selling self defence products have seen an run on their stores. German gun-shop owner Katja Triebel told Breitbart London “the sale of pepper spray has risen, as has sales of blank firing guns which can be loaded with pepper spray cartridges and other paralysers.

“Other means of self defence are prohibited for ordinary citizens in Germany.”

The pepper-spray guns are illegal in the United Kingdom but are freely available in Germany and can be bought without a licence. Ms. Triebel said her regular customers had also reported a sudden surge of interest among their friends and colleagues in visiting a firearms range to try out shooting.

German newspapers have also reported this surge in sales, with one employee of store Globetrotter telling Cologne’s Express:

“We are completely sold out. We sold our last pepper spray on Wednesday. We order new supplies every day, but we always exceed the supply… mostly it is women demanding the products. They buy them for themselves, or for their daughters or girlfriends.”

As women have been encouraged to come forward following dozens of apparently coordinated sexual assaults by migrants near the main train station and the Cathedral in Cologne (pictured above) on New Year’s Eve, the fact the violence wasn’t limited to Cologne has emerged, with many major German cities reporting similar gang rapes and assaults.

The interest in self defence equipment is also spread over Germany, with weapon shops in north-west town Oberhausen also confirming much higher demand over the past few days.

Some of his customers were young women who were studying at the University of Cologne, said the unidentified shop keeper.

With the civilian population arming themselves to defend against migrant attack, there may be concern about migrants taking similar steps. Breitbart London reported in December on one weapon shop owner in east Germany who had taken proactive steps. Placing a sign in his window warning would-be customers he would only serve individuals holding a German passport, the owner of the Laubegaster Wache military surplus and sport shop generated “outrage” among local ‘refugees welcome’ activists.

Making clear for whom the sign was intended, it was posted in five languages — Arabic, Albanian, Persian, Somali and Bosnian — but not German. Multiculturalist campaigner Claus Dethleff said of the move: “I think it’s racist and scandalous… this poster reminds me of 1933.”