JUDY WOODRUFF: German prosecutors today asked for life imprisonment for a right-wing extremist
charged with killing two people last year outside a synagogue in Germany's east.
That comes as calls grow to investigate the extent of neo-Nazi infiltration of the country's security
services; 1,400 cases of far right extremism among soldiers, police officers and intelligence agents
have been documented over the past three years, a frightening echo of Germany's past.
From Berlin, special correspondent Malcolm Brabant reports.
MALCOLM BRABANT: Back to the future in a bleak East Berlin suburb. Right-wingers
marked 30 years of German reunification with a rally ripe with 1930s attitudes.
Up went a chant from a banned neo-Nazi song predicting ultimate victory.
This group has sprung from an outlawed extremist party, The Third Path,
that shares ideology with similar European groups. Its logo contains a nod to Hitler's Third Reich.
MAN (through translator): The last three to four years have clearly shown that
multiculturalism has failed, and it's our job to end it. We have to rely
on our own people for our future, for the safety of our children and grandchildren.
MALCOLM BRABANT: The command? Advance on Berlin.
Alarm bells are ringing about the far right's surge. These protesters wanted
to confront the neo-Nazis. The police kept them apart, as an anti-fascist anthem played.
Militaristic displays are outlawed in Germany. The police ordered them not to march,
but to -- quote -- "saunter casually." The instruction was ignored.
These people are some of the most extreme neo-Nazis in Germany. And there are many
groups like this. But what the authorities are worried about is not these people so much
who are out in public. It's those neo-Nazis who're hiding in the establishment, in the shadows.
This video by the Bundeswehr, the German military,
eulogizes the prowess of an elite special forces unit called the KSK. But, today,
it's in disgrace. One company has been disbanded because of a right-wing extremist culture.
A cache of weapons, ammunition and explosives was found buried at the home of one soldier.
TIMO REINFRANK, Executive Director, Amadeu Antonio Foundation: If you're looking for a special unit
who could take over the German chancellory or the most important ministries within Berlin,
then this was the most important unit to do so.
MALCOLM BRABANT: Timo Reinfrank's mission is to counter right-wing violence. He heads
a foundation named after Amadeu Antonio, an Angolan immigrant murdered by extremists in 1990.
Reinfrank worries that neo-Nazis have infiltrated other branches of the German military.
TIMO REINFRANK: The problem about the army is that we don't know anything. There is a more or
less closed shop that we only hear about in the public from special incidents. But we know that
the majority of the right-wing scene is full of trained people from the German Bundeswehr.
MALCOLM BRABANT: These concerns are shared by Germany's highest echelons.
Last month's celebrations, muted by COVID-19, were supposed to toast
the 30-year-long marriage of East and West Germany after the Iron Curtain disintegrated.
But President Frank-Walter Steinmeier was compelled to call for vigilance against neo-Nazis.
FRANK-WALTER STEINMEIER, German President (through translator): They want another state,
an authoritative state that aggressively excludes parts of society. They see themselves as part of a
tradition that this republic doesn't stand for and that has nothing to do with our democracy.
MALCOLM BRABANT: Hours after that speech, outside Hamburg Synagogue, a man in military
fatigues attacked a Jewish student with a shovel, inflicting grave head injuries.
Germany's anti-Semitism czar, Felix Klein.
DR. FELIX KLEIN, Federal Government Commissioner, Jewish Life in Germany: Nobody can deny
the deadly dimension of anti-Semitism and right-wing extremism in Germany anymore.
Right-wing extremism is a big threat of democracy in Germany.
MALCOLM BRABANT: The German police are not immune either. Confidence in the police was
rocked after 30 officers were suspended for sharing extreme material in online chat rooms
that included images of Adolf Hitler and depictions of a refugee in a gas chamber.
Heike Kleffner leads a nonprofit that supports victims of right-wing violence.
She's one of hundreds of people named on right-wing death lists.
HEIKE KLEFFNER, Author, "Extreme Security": We have police officers who supply right-wing terror
networks with information from police database on political enemies. And we have police officers who
spread anti-Semitic and national socialist propaganda.
MALCOLM BRABANT: Ferat Kocak, a left-wing politician with Turkish heritage,
almost lost his life because of police collusion or negligence. A police inquiry
admitted officers knew neo-Nazis were planning an arson attack on Kocak, but failed to inform him.
FERAT KOCAK, Anti-Racism Activist: The fire spread to the house,
and it was luck that we survived with my family.
I get a lot of messages with death threats. And I'm not the only one. So a lot of friends also
get these death threats, but they always say, it is -- we will wait for the right time to kill you.
MALCOLM BRABANT: The government insists that 99 percent of police officers are anchored in
the law, and only a minority are rotten, a view echoed by Berlin police spokesman Thilo Cablitz.
THILO CABLITZ, German Police Spokesman (through translator):
For us as police officers, it hurts. It hurts because we join this profession with
a certain idealism, and we stand firmly on the ground of our liberal democratic constitution.
And if there are people within our ranks who call themselves police officers,
but who do not share our common understanding and our oath, then it hurts us no end.
MALCOLM BRABANT: Despite official admissions of culpability from both the military and the police,
activists believe there is not enough transparency.
FERAT KOCAK: We have a lot of Nazis in authorities,
and it's important to start to change this now.
HEIKE KLEFFNER: One thing that absolutely needs to happen is an independent scientific research on
the percentage of hard-core racists and anti-Semites within the German police force.
MALCOLM BRABANT: Germany's main concern is the neo-Nazis' ambition
to launch a violent uprising one day in the future.
MAN (through translator):
This situation is precisely our chance to excite people again for a real alternative, to completely
change the system, so that the German people can once again live in a country worth living in.
MALCOLM BRABANT: Although he doesn't believe the Third Reich could be resurrected,
President Steinmeier warned against complacency.
FRANK-WALTER STEINMEIER (through translator):
The colors of this democratic history are the colors black, red and gold, the colors of unity,
justice and freedom. We will not allow them to be driven away, misused or appropriated
MALCOLM BRABANT: The anniversary celebrations culminated at the Brandenburg Gate
that once marked the division between East and West. Beneath its neo-Nazi cloud,
Germany is a long way from being truly united.
For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Malcolm Brabant in Berlin.