Police in Germany are investigating an alarming series of sexual assaults on women trying to celebrate the New Year by large groups of single men “of Arab or North African appearance”.
Authorities in the city of Cologne are to hold a crisis meeting on Tuesday after police described a group of some 1,000 men who took over the area around the main station on New Year’s Eve.
Women were robbed, groped, and had their underwear torn from their bodies, while couples had fireworks thrown at them.
Police have received 90 criminal complaints, around a quarter of them for sexual assault, including one case of rape.
Police in Hamburg say there was a series of similar incidents in the city’s Reeperbahn red-light area. Witnesses described groups of five to 15 men of who “hunted” women in the streets.
In Cologne, the attacks took place around the main station, opposite the cathedral, a traditional gathering spot to see in the New Year. » | Justin Huggler, Berlin | Tuesday, January 5, 2015
