Germany: Memorial oak cut by anti-fascist group in protest

Published on 30/08/2012 00:00

A LEFTIST group has chopped down an oak planted to commemorate one of Germany’s worst post-war racist attacks.

AG anti-fascist Foxtail said it felled the tree on Tuesday in protest over the use of a symbol of German nationalism as a memorial to those who suffered during the 1992 far-right riot in Rostock.

During the riot Neo-Nazis firebombed an apartment block inhabited by foreigners as hundreds of bystanders cheered.

Police confirmed the tree, planted on Sunday at a memorial attended by president Joachim Gauck, had been “trimmed by several metres.”