in the u.s a gunman accused of killing
eight people in the state of georgia has
been charged with murder
the 21 year old was arrested after a
shooting spree at three massage parlors
in the atlanta area
most of the victims were women of asian
descent
the killings have prompted outrage among
some rights groups who say the violence
is part of a recent surge in anti-asian
hate crimes
dw's bastian hartek reports now from new
york on a growing sense of insecurity in
the city's asian community
every day esther barroso gerson makes
her way from her workplace to the post
office to the west village in lower
manhattan
usually considered a safe area in new
york city
but one day about a year ago she
experienced something that she hasn't
been able
to forget right about here
as i was on the phone someone was so
close from behind me
came from here and then just started
spitting
at me at the time cases of coed 19 were
surging in new york city
then president donald trump was pushing
anti-asian rhetoric
calling it the china virus making people
of asian descent
people like esther a target for racist
attackers
i just kept yelling at him why would you
do this why would you do this right at
this time
and he yelled at me because you're sick
for weeks she says she couldn't walk
these streets without constantly looking
over her shoulder and even now there are
some scars from that day that haven't
healed
it's the feeling of violence being
violated
that feeling of
not being alone
and the feeling of disgust those three
things are kind of hard to
erase i guess from my memory anti-asian
hate crimes have surged all over the
united states in the past
year in new york city alone their number
has increased more than eight-fold
activists say that's just the tip of the
iceberg many victims often don't want to
come forward
don't want to speak to the police the
new york police department has set up a
specific task force to reach out to the
asian
american community a lot of them don't
speak the language
a lot of them are undocumented they're
afraid of coming to the police
a lot of them don't want to cooperate
because they don't want to miss work
they also fear retaliation this task
force builds that bridge
to that community of victims we convince
them we
get we gain the cooperation we tell them
the benefits of cooperating
we have officers who speak their
language have similar heritage a step in
the right direction but for many new
york's asian-american community not
nearly enough to tackle a problem
that's plagued them since the very
beginning manhattan's chinatown is one
of the oldest chinese ethnic enclaves
the first chinese migrants settled down
here back in the 1850s
and the recent increase in anti-asian
hate crimes is just the latest flare-up
in a long history of anti-asian
sentiment
which is just as old as the migration
from asia to the united states
itself especially in times of national
crisis like now during the pandemic
americans of asian descent have
repeatedly been made the scapegoat for
the country's plight
we are known as a perpetual foreigners
we are permanent foreigners
you can be here for many many
generations and there's always this
assumption
because of the way we look people say
where are you from
where are you really from right and when
we say but we're from here
nobody believes you so i think it's easy
to
target and victimize people that you
don't think belong here
and that you don't think are americans
and i think that's the whole underlying
system of
the race you know of racism in this
country despite what she's experienced
esther barroso gerson still considers
the u.s her home
she's been here for more than 20 years
and she hasn't given up hope that things
will one day
get better if people educate themselves
they end up
being more informed they end up being
kinder
i think then hatred against other
races would eventually stop
but for now many asian americans remain
vigilant
as every new attack further fans the
fear among
their community