Tag: germany

German States Expand Police Powers to Train AI Surveillance Systems with Personal Data

Several German states are preparing to widen police powers by allowing personal data to be used in the training of surveillance technologies.

North Rhine-Westphalia and Baden-Württemberg are introducing legislative changes that would let police feed identifiable information such as names and facial images into commercial AI systems.

Both drafts permit this even when anonymization or pseudonymization is bypassed because the police consider it “impossible” or achievable only with “disproportionate effort.”

Hamburg adopted similar rules earlier this year, and its example appears to have encouraged other regions to follow. These developments together mark a clear move toward normalizing the use of personal information as fuel for surveillance algorithms.

The chain reaction began in Bavaria, where police in early 2024 tested Palantir’s surveillance software with real personal data.

The experiment drew objections from the state’s data protection authority, but still served as a model for others.

Hamburg used the same idea in January 2025 to amend its laws, granting permission to train “learning IT systems” on data from bystanders. Now Baden-Württemberg and North Rhine-Westphalia plan to adopt nearly identical language.

In North Rhine-Westphalia, police would be allowed to upload clear identifiers such as names or faces into commercial systems like Palantir’s and to refine behavioral or facial recognition programs with real, unaltered data.

Bettina Gayk, the state’s data protection officer, warned that “the proposed regulation addresses significant constitutional concerns.”

She argued that using data from people listed as victims or complainants was excessive and added that “products from commercial providers are improved with the help of state-collected and stored data,” which she found unacceptable.

The state government has embedded this expansion of surveillance powers into a broader revision of the Police Act, a change initially required by the Federal Constitutional Court.

The court had previously ruled that long-term video monitoring under the existing law violated the Basic Law.

Instead of narrowing these powers, the new draft introduces a clause allowing police to “develop, review, change or train IT products” with personal data.

This wording effectively enables continued use of Palantir’s data analysis platform while avoiding the constitutional limits the court demanded.

Across North Rhine-Westphalia, Baden-Württemberg, and Hamburg, the outcome will be similar: personal data can be used for training as soon as anonymization is judged to be disproportionately difficult, with the assessment left to police discretion.

Gayk has urged that the use of non-anonymized data be prohibited entirely, warning that the exceptions are written so broadly that “they will ultimately not lead to any restrictions in practice.”

Baden-Württemberg’s green-black coalition plans to pass its bill this week.

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Germany to funnel more cash into Ukraine’s corruption-plagued energy sector

Germany has pledged to provide Ukraine with an additional €40 million in an effort to prop up its power generation during the winter, Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul has said. The announcement comes as Ukraine’s energy industry finds itself mired in a corruption scandal allegedly linked to an ally of leader Vladimir Zelensky.

Speaking on Tuesday, Wadephul said Berlin was “helping Ukrainians survive another winter of war with an additional €40 million ($46 million).” The diplomat noted that this year alone Germany has already spent €9 billion on military aid for Kiev.

A day earlier, the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) announced that it was investigating a “high-level criminal organization” which allegedly profited from contracts involving state-owned nuclear energy company Energoatom.

According to the authorities, the ring forced Energoatom officials and contractors to pay kickbacks for state contracts. Formal charges have so far been brought against seven unnamed individuals. The Ukrainian media has claimed that one of the suspects is Timur Mindich, a close associate and former business partner of Zelensky. The businessman allegedly fled Ukraine just hours before his home was raided by NABU agents.

Mindich’s personal and business ties to the Ukrainian leader are understood to date back to when Zelensky was actively involved in the entertainment industry.

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Most Germans Oppose Combustion Engine Bans And Meat Reduction Measures To Save The Planet

A majority of Germans oppose key government climate protection proposals such as banning combustion engines, restricting meat consumption, or imposing flat-rate taxes on air travel, according to a YouGov poll conducted shortly before the 30th UN Climate Change Conference in Belém, Brazil.

The survey suggests that citizens are more likely to back environmental measures that either benefit them directly or avoid placing major financial burdens on households.

As reported by Stern, 69 percent of respondents said they opposed a ban on diesel and petrol vehicles, while 68 percent were against limiting weekly purchases of meat and dairy products, while 56 percent rejected the idea of higher air travel costs through a flat-rate ticket tax.

Conversely, strong majorities supported subsidies for energy-efficient housing (69 percent), measures to strengthen domestic production (71 percent), bans on single-use plastics (69 percent), and higher taxes on high-emission companies (66 percent).

The German government has pledged to reach climate neutrality by 2045 — sooner than many industrialized nations—but its progress in reducing emissions has slowed, particularly in the transport and housing sectors. According to the survey, while most Germans agree that climate change is a serious issue and largely caused by human activity, the willingness to change personal behavior remains limited.

Only around a quarter of those surveyed said they would voluntarily reduce air travel or meat consumption, or switch to an electric car. Even fewer expressed willingness to stop eating animal products altogether or to buy only second-hand clothing. Measures that are convenient or low-cost — such as avoiding single-use plastics or adding greenery to balconies — were far more popular.

Despite a reluctance to alter lifestyles, 46 percent of Germans believe the worst effects of climate change can still be prevented if drastic changes are implemented, while 16 percent think the status quo is sufficient, and 15 percent believe it is already too late to avert the crisis.

Concern about global warming has nonetheless declined: 63 percent say they are worried about the issue, the lowest figure for two years, as global conflicts, inflation, and energy prices take center stage.

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German Investigation Into Nord Stream Pipeline Attack Threatens To Blow up European Support for the Ukrainian Perpetrators: REPORT

Euro-Globalists want to prevent German authorities to prosecute the Ukrainian suspects.

While the world went about its business, for the last three years, a group of top German investigators applied themselves to an investigation that apparently no one in Europe wants resolved.

We are talking about what WSJ calls ‘the greatest act of sabotage in modern history’ – the bombing of the Nord Stream pipelines.

The problem with the German investigation is that, instead of pointing to the usual suspects (Russia), the evidence led the detectives towards a plot emanating from Ukraine – the obvious beneficiary.

Evidence of Ukrainian involvement in the attack includes: location, tracking, facial recognition, and links to veteran divers who participated in the operation.

The fact that German police won’t try to frame Moscow for blowing up its own pipeline has set European countries against each other.

Take Poland, for example: not only did they refuse to extradite one of the suspects to stand trial in Germany, they actually branded him a ‘hero’ for destroying Russian infrastructure.

The Wall Street Journal reported (behind a paywall):

“Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, who has long questioned Germany’s dependence on Russian energy, ridiculed the investigation. The problem isn’t that the pipeline was blown up, he said. The ‘problem is that it was built.’”

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German Investigators Say Ukrainian Military Unit Carried Out Nord Stream Bombing

A team of German detectives believes that an elite Ukrainian military unit carried out the bombing of the Nord Stream pipelines in September 2022. So far, Berlin has requested the arrest and extradition of two Ukrainians for their role in the sabotage attack. 

According to the Wall Street Journal, the investigator claims an elite Ukrainian military unit carried out the attacks under the direct supervision of Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, then-commander of the Ukrainian armed forces. Zaluzhny is currently serving as the ambassador to the UK. 

The German detectives say Zaluzhny ordered the elite unit and divers to plant explosives on the pipelines that carried natural gas from Russia to central Europe. 

Berlin has so far issued arrest warrants for two Ukrainians, whom they believe are involved in the attack. One person was arrested in Italy and is currently being extradited to Germany. A second man was detained in Poland. However, Warsaw is refusing to extradite the Ukrainian, as Poland supports the bombing of the Nord Stream pipelines. 

According to the WSJ, German investigators have a myriad of evidence linking the Ukrainian military unit to the crime, including phone records, photos, and boat rental records. 

Russian and German gas companies jointly owned the Nord Stream pipelines. If the investigator’s accusation proves true, it could complicate relations between Kiev and Berlin. 

Currently, Germany is Ukraine’s largest financial backer. Earlier this month, Germany transferred two Patriot air defense systems to Ukraine.

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Endgame For Germany’s Industrial Power Prices: Green Deal Failure Sparks Subsidy Spiral

On Thursday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz hosted top executives from the German steel industry at a summit in the the Chancellery to discuss solutions to the deepening crisis. Since the peak year of 2018, German steel production has fallen by around 25 percent.

Germany’s economic crisis is accelerating. Sky-high energy costs, relentless competition from China and India, and the EU’s absurd push for “green steel”—a climate-neutral variant no one demands on the world market—are pushing companies either into insolvency or out of the country.

Thursday’s meeting will bring together industry representatives, unions, and policymakers to chart the next steps for a sector facing its most severe turbulence in decades.

This is just the latest in a string of crisis summits orchestrated by the federal government for media effect. Awareness is demonstrated—solutions? Not so much. For Germany’s economy, political “solutions” increasingly mean one standard instrument: more subsidies.

A One-Issue Summit

Aside from the expected push for protective tariffs, the summit can be reduced to a single dispute: the so-called industrial electricity price. While many energy-intensive companies already receive partial relief, it is far from enough to remain internationally competitive.

Industrial electricity prices have hovered around 16–17 ct/kWh for months. German industry still pays up to 70 percent more than U.S. or French competitors, who benefit from nuclear power as their energy base.

This is the cost of the green transition.

And with it come job losses, shrinking value creation, and, for the first time, sharply declining municipal tax revenues.

Unsurprisingly, the federal government is ready to approve this subsidy. We are deep in a spiral of interventionism.

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Convicted Paedophile Wanted in Germany Was Housed in UK Migrant Hotel

The British government placed a convicted paedophile wanted by German authorities in a migrant hotel and is paying for his legal defence against extradition, sparking outrage from local MPs.

Izalden Alshaik Suleman, 32, was detained by the National Crime Agency (NCA) at the Britannia Ashley Hotel in Hale last month and now faces deportation to Germany where he is wanted for a child sex offence.

His detention at the hotel, which has been used to house alleged asylum seekers at taxpayer expense since 2023, has sparked questions as to why the government placed the convicted paedophile within the accommodation in the first place, rather than immediately removing him from the country.

Speaking to the Altrincham Today publication, Local MP Connor Rand said: “The individual who has been arrested should never have been allowed into the country. I understand they now face extradition, and I will be writing to the Home Office to request they are deported as soon as possible.”

Rand went on to reveal that the NCA failed to inform local authorities, including himself, the Greater Manchester Police, or the local Trafford Council about their plans to arrest Suleman as the hotel.

“While I am grateful to the NCA for their work to apprehend a clearly dangerous individual, I share the anger of residents that we were kept in the dark about such a serious incident,” he said.

A member of the governing left-wing Labour Party, Rand said that he has urged Prime Minister Starmer’s government to shut down migrant accommodation at the Ashley Hotel as well as the Cresta Court migrant hotel, and said that he has received assurances that they will both be shut, but did not disclose any timeline.

The leader of the Trafford Conservatives Cllr Nathan Evans said that it was “outrageous” for a convicted pedophile to be housed in the hotel, saying: “We have been mocked by the Greens, Lib Dems, Labour and I even got a letter from the churches saying we were wrong to call these facilities inappropriate. These are the places we should not be housing these illegal migrants.”

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Antifa Firebombs German AfD Lawmaker’s Car As Left-Wing Terrorism Across West Triggers Alarm-Bells

Left-wing political violence is metastasizing across the Western world like stage-four cancer.

From the political assassination of Charlie Kirk by a furry-loving leftist, to the transgender extremist who massacred Christians in a Minneapolis church, to Antifa terror cells attacking ICE facilities and torching the vehicles of their political opponents in Europe, the West must come to its senses. These are not isolated events, but likely interconnected violent acts. Massive funding networks fuel some of these far-left pressure campaigns, as we’ve shown. EU-based billionaires have funneled more than $2 billion into U.S. nonprofits to fund part of the protest-industrial complex against President Trump to derail the ‘America First’ agenda. 

All of this is unfolding as more Westerners reject “wokeism” and the Marxist power grip begins to crack under the Trump 2.0 era. The West must confront a very dark and grim truth: the modern far-left has normalized political assassination culture, targeting opponents with violence, arson, and even acts of sabotage, such as the 2024 power grid attack in Berlin that shut down Elon Musk’s factory.

Even the deep-state media outlet The Atlantic couldn’t ignore the alarming rise of what it called “left-wing terrorism.”

Context matters. People must understand that this surge in left-wing violence on both sides of the Atlantic is not random or isolated – it’s possibly coordinated. Their objective is clear: to crush the rise of anti-globalist, anti-Marxist movements and, above all, to stop “Trump-like” populist uprisings gaining momentum across the West at any cost. To accomplish this, the left has weaponized its militant street arm – Antifa – composed of purple-haired, gender-confused warriors who serve as expendable enforcers to carry out political objectives through chaos and intimidation.

This brings us to the latest Antifa attack on the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, in which the party’s parliamentary secretary, Bernd Baumann, saw his car firebombed outside his home, an act local media outlets suspect was carried out by an Antifa terror cell.

German news outlet DPA International reported that “left-wing platform Indymedia on Monday suggests the car was set on fire by members of the anti-fascist Antifa movement early on Monday morning.” 

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Zelensky Says Ukraine Received More Patriot Systems

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Kiev had received additional Patriot missile defense systems from Germany. 

“Today, we can already say there is a good result for our air defense – Ukraine now has more Patriots. I would like to thank Chancellor Merz, I thank Germany, and everyone who helps,” Zelensky said on Sunday. “More Patriots are now in Ukraine and being put into operation.”

Ukraine has relied on its Western backers for Patriot systems, which are in high demand from Washington’s partners across the globe. While the Patriot is Ukraine’s most effective air defense system, the Financial Times reported last month that the American system is failing to intercept Russian missiles at an increasing pace.  

“Ukraine’s ballistic missile interception rate improved over the summer, reaching 37% in August, but it plummeted to 6% in September, despite fewer launches,” the outlet explained. “The Patriot interceptors are the only ones in Kiev’s arsenal capable of shooting down Russian ballistic missiles. Moscow’s cruise missiles can be taken down with less sophisticated air defences, but the updates have made it harder to do so,” officials speaking with FT said. 

Russian ballistic missiles are far cheaper to produce than the Patriot interceptors. 

After thanking his backers for sending Ukraine the advanced air defense systems, Zelensky asked for more. “Of course, more systems are needed to protect key infrastructure sites and our cities across the entire territory of our state.” He continued, “And we will continue working to obtain them – not only at the political level with states and leaders but also directly with manufacturers of all necessary air defense systems and missiles for them.”

NATO officials continue to claim that the bloc will provide Ukraine with all it needs to fight. However, Last month, the US Ambassador to NATO said that the alliance would only provide Kiev with $12-$15 billion in military assistance, far short of the $60 billion Zelensky says Ukraine will need. 

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Will The AfD Party Be Banned In Germany?

There are once again efforts to ban the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in the Bundestag, with the far-left Social Democrats (SPD) leading the way. However, there is some difficult math facing the proponents of an AfD ban, which makes it unlikely — but not impossible — for the party to be banned.

In order to understand why a ban is unlikely, let us first look at what would actually happen if a ban of the AfD went forward.

The AfD is currently the most popular party in the country, according to multiple polls, scoring between 25 and 27 percent of the vote. This alone makes a ban unthinkable to many, but the German establishment does not especially care what the electorate thinks on a number of key issues, so why not just ban the party?

For starters, and most importantly, a ban of the AfD would radically reshape the German electorate in favor of the left. This would translate into the Christian Democrats (CDU) losing a massive amount of power, and potentially being relegated to the political dustbin. Due to this cold, hard reality, a ban could be suicidal for the CDU.

How one local elections tells us about the federal election

What happened in the local mayoral election in Ludwigshafen tells us what the likely outcome of an AfD ban would be for the country at the federal level. In Ludwigshafen, the AfD’s Joachim Paul was leading the polls to become mayor before he was banned from running through backroom bureaucratic channels, a move later confirmed by judges during a number of appeals. The judges all argued Paul would have to challenge the ban after the election. Paul is still filing legal actions against the decision, but the outcome of the appeal could take months or even years.

Regardless of the outcome of Paul’s appeal, the election had some interesting outcomes.

First, the voter participation rate crashed to a record low of just 29.3 percent. In 2017’s mayoral election in Ludwigshafen, the then-SPD candidate Jutta Steinruck won with 60.2 percent participation. That means voter turnout was cut in half from that election.

That is not all. For those who did vote, many of them appear to have submitted “spoiled” ballots. A record-high number of ballots were ruled invalid, at 9.2 percent. Eight years ago, that number was just 2.6 percent. The number of “spoiled ballots” jumped by nearly 400 percent.

If this same outcome occurred at the federal level, including a dramatic crash in the voter participation rate as AfD supporters boycott the election, it would be a disaster for the CDU’s electoral chances.

The way the German system works means that the pool of right-wing voters would shrink dramatically, leaving CDU voters and the left as the only remaining voting pool. However, this remaining, much smaller pool, would then feature a dramatically larger share of left-wing voters consisting of the SPD, the Greens, and the Left Party.

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