FRANKFURT AM MAIN, Germany (AFP) — German police raided locations across the country early Friday in a probe against an extreme-right group suspected of planning "attacks on politicians, asylum-seekers and people of Muslim faith," prosecutors said.
The raids, some by heavily armed special units, hit 13 locations in six German states.
Under plans by five prime suspects and eight supporters, "a civil-war-like situation was to be brought about via as yet undefined attacks on politicians, asylum seekers and people of Muslim faith," federal prosecutors said in a statement.
From its founding in September 2019, the group’s aim was "to shake the state and social order in Germany and in the end to overturn it," investigators said.
Alongside the five prime suspects, the eight supporters "are believed to have agreed to provide financial support, procure weapons or take part in future attacks," prosecutors said.
Investigators launched Friday's raids to determine whether the suspects already had weapons or other supplies that could be used in an attack.
So far, no one has been arrested over the alleged attack plot, prosecutors said.
German authorities have turned increased attention to the country's extreme right since the murder of conservative local politician Walter Luebcke last June and an October attack on a synagogue in eastern city Halle.
Suspects arrested in both cases have ties to the extreme right.
Interior minister Horst Seehofer in December announced 600 new posts in the federal police and domestic security services to track far-right extremist threats, citing a growing danger.
At the time, federal police said they had identified 48 people on the extreme right as "dangerous" people who could carry out an attack.
© Agence France-Presse
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