A speaker for Germany domestic intelligence agency confirmed a report, first published in the Berlin daily Tagesspiegel, that revealed authorities estimate the number of Reichsbürger, which roughly translates as "Citizens of the Reich," to be around 15,000. [...]
The radical Reichsbürger movement subscribes to the idea that the 1937 borders of the German Empire still exist and that the modern-day Federal Republic of Germany is an administrative construct and still occupied by the Western powers. [...]
However, while easily dismissed as crackpots, many Reichsbürger ascribe to right-wing, anti-Semitic and Nazi ideologies. The movement gained significant traction after a member shot dead a policeman in Bavaria in October last year.
BfV President Hans-Georg Maassen on Thursday said authorities would concentrate their efforts in cracking down on the Reichsbürger scene. The danger posed by the movement becomes particularly apparent "when the Reichsbürger believe they have to resort to force to oppose legitimate police and judicial operations," he said.
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