Star March Coalition: The Star March Coalition responds to the ‘danger prognosis’ of the police, police department’s function in this process declared unlawful

Press Prelease

25th May 2007

*The Star March Coalition responds to the ‘danger prognosis’ of the police, police department’s function in this process declared unlawful

• Germany Army ready to be deployed against demonstrators
• Mail of G8 prostesters to be intercepted and read

With an injunction, the police have forbidden the star march to Heilgendamm, due to take place on June 7th, and all other protest assemblies scheduled for the G8 Summit, within a distance of 3km from the fence around Heiligendamm and the area surrounding the military airport Rostock Laage.

However, the tide may be turning: The police department that issued the ban is now the target of inquiry. The star march lawyers have found constitutional deficiencies in the way that Kavala operates:

“In the attempt to create an ad hoc department, ‘Kavala’, to prevent any assemblies, insufficient attention was paid to basic constitutional laws. According to my judgment, this thus means that the injunction itself is unconstitutional”, Carsten Gericke, solicitor for the star march coalition comments.

The solicitors acting on behalf of the star march coalition further criticize that, “other de-escalation and staggered measures were at no point considered […] the issuing of a ‘state of emergency’ denies citizens their basic rights”. The assumption that every large political event demands the designation of such a ‘state of emergency’ reflects badly on the constitutional State, creating the conditions to regularly impede civil liberties through general injunctions without any justification for doing so […] general injunctions have never stopped assemblies but have often contributed to escalation through limiting the space for protest to be articulated legally”.

[Star March Coalition]