Mayor stabbed over refugee stance
GERMAN Chancellor Angela Merkel yesterday condemned a near-fatal knife attack on a town mayor, apparently motivated by his pro-refugee stance and which left him with a 15cm neck wound.
Andreas Hollstein, 54, mayor of the western town of Altena, was stabbed on Monday evening at a kebab shop by a man who had loudly criticised his liberal refugee policy.
Hollstein said that without two shop employees who rushed to help him, he would probably not be here today.
With a large bandage on his neck and a wavering voice, he said the 56-year-old male assailant had asked him if he was the mayor before pulling the knife, and then said: “You let me die of thirst and take in 200 refugees in Altena.”
Merkel, who has faced a strong backlash over her welcoming stance toward refugees, was horrified by the attack on Hollstein and relieved that he was already able to return to his family, her spokesman Steffen Seibert tweeted. “Thanks also to those who helped him.” Hollstein, a member of Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU), said he believed a coarsening of the public debate about refugees had led to the assault.
“I even received e-mails today approving of the attack – that says something about the state of our country,” he said. He and his family had received threats in recent years.
Hollstein said the attacker appeared to be under the influence of alcohol but was not incapacitated. It had taken three men to overpower him.
The assailant was arrested at the scene while Hollstein was taken to hospital and, after treatment, released hours later, police said, referring to an “apparent xenophobic motive”.
The snackshop owner, Demir Abdullah, who came to Hollstein’s aid along with his son, who was also injured in the attack, confirmed that the assailant had specifically targeted Hollstein.
The town of about 17 000 people was known for taking in a larger share of asylum seekers than required amid the mass influx that has brought more than a million migrants to Germany since 2015.
Hollstein, whose town won a national award in May for its work with refugees, said he had no plans to reverse his stance on welcoming refugees.