Government sources told AFP that among his targets was the Minister of Health, the Social Democrat Karl Lauterbach, who claimed to have felt “shocked” when he found out.
The network, which brings together some “70 people” in the country and calls itself “United Patriots” was aimed at destroying the “German democratic system”, reported the police and the prosecutor’s office of the Rhineland Palatinate region (southwest).
Members talked to each other about topics such as “the overthrow of the democratic order and the installation of a new government. Also about statements according to which (Russian President Vladimir) Putin should succeed here in Germany to allow the advent of a new system”, detailed Roger Lewentz, Minister of the Interior of Rhineland-Palatinate.
The suspects had also planned to attack the electricity grid and cause “significant blackouts throughout the territory”, which would have created, according to them, the basis for a “civil war”.
The authorities have been investigating this group since October 2021.
During their raid on Wednesday, they seized firearms, ammunition, gold bars and silver coins, and cash worth 10,000 euros. They also found documents detailing the group’s plans and fake coronavirus vaccination certificates.
The detainees are between 41 and 55 years old.
Police operations against these radical sectors that oppose health restrictions have increased in Germany, where extreme right-wing violence is considered the main risk to public order, ahead of jihadist threats.
“We are going to fight the enemies of our democracy with all the means of the rule of law,” promised Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Twitter.
Germany has been on alert for far-right terrorism since the murder in June 2019 by a neo-Nazi militant of a deputy from Angela Merkel’s conservative party, who defended the former chancellor’s policy of welcoming migrants.
His death shocked the country and since then police operations are frequent.
The entrance Far-right anticovid activists arrested for preparing “violent attacks” was first published in diary TODAY.
