Grey Wolves are howling again. Turkish fascists and their networks in Germany.
Prof Dr Kemal Bozay, professor at the Internationale Hochschule in Düsseldorf and Cologne.
When: Wednesday, 4 April 2022, 7:00 pm
Where: livestream on Facebook & YouTube
Event in cooperation with the Literaturhandlung
Who are the Grey Wolves and what do they believe in? What is the history of their emergence in Germany and how can they be countered socially and politically? What danger do they pose to democracy?
At present, the Turkish far-right organisation known as the “Grey Wolves” is more present in public debate than ever before. It recently became known that a supporter of the Grey Wolves works for the Berlin police. What makes this particularly explosive is that his unit was tasked with protecting endangered sites, including synagogues.
In the past there have been several calls for the group to be banned. In November 2020 the Deutscher Bundestag, in a joint motion by the Union, SPD, FDP and Greens, called on the federal government to examine a ban on Grey Wolves associations and to “counter them resolutely with the means of our constitutional state”. What sounds like an underground organisation is in fact remarkably firmly anchored in Germany in organisational terms: the German offshoot of the Turkish “Nationalist Movement Party” alone has more than 7,000 members, organised in over 170 local associations. With more than 18,000 members, the Grey Wolves are considered one of the largest right-wing extremist organisations in Germany.
There is nothing hidden about this. Their supporters openly identify themselves through the “wolf salute” and other well-known symbols. By now a familiar sight at demonstrations by Turkish nationalists.
The Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution) concludes that their world view violates “the principle of human dignity formulated in the Basic Law as well as the principle of equality guaranteed therein”.
We talk about the “Grey Wolves” with the expert Prof Kemal Bozay.
