OREANDA-NEWS. Demonstrations against coronavirus restrictions were held again in a number of German cities over the weekend. In Thuringian Greitz, according to police, 14 police officers were injured during such actions. Following calls for protests posted on social media, about thousand people gathered there on Saturday, police said on Sunday, December 12. After the protesters tried to break through the police cordon, the police were forced to use pepper spray against the demonstrators.

Videos published on Twitter show protesters getting into a fight with the police, trying to break through the cordon. A photojournalist of the dpa agency, who was at the scene of the events, spoke about the aggressive mood of the demonstrators. Two injured police officers had to be suspended from service, and one law enforcement officer was hospitalized, the police said. The police identified 207 protesters, issued 108 decisions banning a number of specific persons from a certain territory and initiated 44 criminal cases. In addition, 47 cases of administrative offenses have been opened.

In Reutlingen (federal state of Baden-Württemberg) on Saturday, according to police, about 1,5 thousand people took part in a rally under the motto «For freedom, truth and self-determination». According to law enforcement officers, the participants of the action ignored requests to put on protective masks. As a result, the rally was dispersed. According to the police, one group, however, continued the march, during which individual participants launched pyrotechnics and flares. When the police tried to stop the demonstration, the protesters forcibly broke through the police chain. Law enforcement officers were forced to use pepper spray and batons. In one evening, several criminal cases were opened on charges of abusive behavior towards law enforcement officers and an attempt to inflict bodily harm on police officers. In addition, about 100 people were banned from being in the area.

In Plauen, located in the east of Saxony, police stopped an unauthorized demonstration involving several hundred people on Sunday evening. The personal data of 226 participants were taken.

Almost 100 people took part in a banned demonstration in Frankfurt am Main (Federal State of Hesse) on Saturday. According to the police, an unregistered protest march against anti-COVID measures with the participation of 550 people was stopped by police in Hamm (federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia) on Saturday. People also took to the streets in Hamburg, Trier, Berlin, Schwerin, various cities on the territory of Saxony-Anhalt and Bavaria to protest against anti-COVID measures. However, these demonstrations were peaceful in nature.