Four years ago today, in Hanau, less than five kilometers from where I have lived all my life, nine of our fellow citizens with a migration background were murdered in a racist and right-wing extremist act of terrorism by a paranoid German. His name is unimportant.
It is their names that must not be forgotten: Gökhan Gültekin, Sedat Gürbüz, Said Nesar Hashemi, Mercedes Kierpacz, Hamza Kurtović, Vili Viorel Păun, Fatih Saraçoğlu, Ferhat Unvar and Kaloyan Velkov.
What has happened in the 1,461 days since then?
After an attack like this, the state and the authorities in our country have a duty to take measures to prevent such acts from happening again. Unfortunately, it has to be said that Germany has so far failed to do so.
There has still been no official apology from the Hessian Minister of the Interior for the documented mistakes made by the police. There is no memorial to the victims on the central market square. Relatives are still being harassed by the perpetrator’s father.
For years, Germany has had more right-wing extremist offenses than any other European country. Since 1990, well over 200 people have died as a result of right-wing violence in Germany. It started with what they called „Dönermorde“, kebab murders, blaming the victims for their criminal lives – which were as criminal as yours and mine.
In November last year, senior politicians from Germany’s far-right AfD party, politicians from the conservative CDU party, Austrian neo-Nazis and German businessmen met in a hotel near Potsdam to fine-tune their plan for the forced deportation of millions of people currently living in Germany. They called it „Remigration“.
Thousands of people commemorated the victims in Hanau this Saturday. Around 5,000 demonstrators took to the streets to make a statement against racism, anti-Semitism and right-wing extremism.
Today a „silent memorial“ is planned at the main cemetery in Hanau. The relatives and friends of the victims would have liked a public memorial in the centre. However, Hanau’s Mayor Claus Kaminsky and other representatives of the city said that a new beginning was needed and warned against a „counterproductive“ event.
I was moved to tears when Said Etris Hashemi, in his book „The Day I Was Supposed to Die“, described how he lost his younger brother Nesar. He himself, the older brother, barely survived the attack, while the younger brother died next to him.
Çetin Gültekin also wrote a book „Gökhan Gültekin: Born, Raised and Murdered in Germany“ about his brother, who was one of the victims.
Remember their names: Gökhan Gültekin, Sedat Gürbüz, Said Nesar Hashemi, Mercedes Kierpacz, Hamza Kurtović, Vili Viorel Păun, Fatih Saraçoğlu, Ferhat Unvar and Kaloyan Velkov. The name of their murderer is unimportant.