Germany : Far-right MP investigated over anti-Muslim tweets

Beatrix von Stroch, a German politician who served as Deputy Leader of the Alternative for Germany since July 2015 and Member of the Bundestag since September 2017, had her Twitter and Facebook accounts deactivated on New Year’s Eve, for calling Muslim men violent and barbaric, reports the German TV channel DW news.

On New Year’s Eve, the Cologne police posted a message in Arabic on Twitter, wishing every a happy new year. The tweet did not obviously please the German MP who replied : «What the hell is happening in this country? Why is an official police site tweeting in Arabic? Do you think it is to appease the barbaric, gang-raping hordes of Muslim men ?» wrote Beatrix von Storch.

#PolizeiNRW #Köln #Leverkusen
تتمنى الشرطة في كولن لجميع الناس في منطقة كولن وليفركوزن والمدن الأخرى إحتفالاً سعيداً بعام 2018 الجديد.
https://t.co/G5erMWFNQyرأس السنة 2017 ـ لمزيد المعلومات: # pic.twitter.com/BGxs4Kew7K

— Polizei NRW K (@polizei_nrw_k) 31 décembre 2017

Twitter reacted quickly by removing the account of Beatrix von Storch informing her that she violated the terms and conditions of the social media platform. As a result, her account was disabled on Monday, for 12 hours. The Cologne police, meanwhile, said on Monday that they have filed a criminal complaint against von Storch for hate speech.

Once her Twitter account was reactivated, von Storch also announced that her Facebook account had been «censored» because of a hate complaint. «Facebook has also censored me. That is the end of the constitutional state», she wrote, showing the message she received from the company.

A new censorship German law known as NetzDG has been submitted on January the 1 to crack down on hate speech online.