German Police dismantle Nazi youth camp

**Honey** · August 13th, 2008, 07:24 PM

[PHOTO by RECHERCHE-NORD]

The 39 children and young people were housed in 14 tents that formed a camp in the quiet countryside near Güstrow, in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The children had books with songs and studied Nazi racist texts. Part of the camp was decorated with swastikas and other illegal symbols.

German police, who dissolved the camp last week, were explicit: "Practices and rituals of the National Socialist era were performed there." Already in May, the authorities had searched the premises of the organizing group, Patriotic German Youth (also known by its Germand acronym HDJ.) The HDJ is legal in Germany and organizes various youth camps each year throughout the country.

Singing martial hymns, acquiring skills and military marching with torches at sunset are some of the legal activities of the HDJ camps for youth. However, the group's illegal activities are also known. Coming out of several police raids and stings were reports by the internal secret service (Verfassungsschutz) showing that HDJ used swastikas and other paraphernalia of the Adolf Hitler regime banned by German law.

So far, evidence of illegal activities including incitement to racial hatred, have only led in 2007 to the banning of the uniforms of the organization. A few months ago, several media reports and some parliamentary petitions provoked a debate on a total ban of the HDJ. The most recent police raid and dissolution of the camp near Güstrow has re-ignited that debate.

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