It is a fiery appeal to fight for “Fortress Europe” — and against refugees. A rally in Leipzig for Legida: Tatjana Festerling, ex-frontwoman of Pegida, is standing on Monday evening on the truck stage. She is wearing a camouflage jacket, with the insignia of a paramilitary vigilante group from Bulgaria on the lapel, and appeals to the men who are present in the Richard Wagner Plaza — especially those “with military or police training” — to travel to the Black Sea and join the operations of the “patriots” at the border region with Turkey against the “invaders.” That, she said, is “what the elites want to prevent by all means. The living friendship between European peoples.”
In the past week, in the framework of an extensive European trip, Festerling travelled from Denmark through Slovakia, Hungary and Romania as well as Bulgaria. Together with her comrade-in-arms Edwin Wagensveld, who became famous in Pegida as “Ed the Dutchman,” she joined the patrols of the Vasil-Levski Brigade, a kind of private homeland army of nationalists. She praises the leader Vladimir Rusev as “warmhearted and upright and especially also an experienced military man,” very much appreciated by the population in Bulgaria.
Sven Hell @SvenMFGN
[Here you can clearly recognize the wolf symbol of the refugee hunters on the uniform of #Festerling . #le0407 #nolegida]
She also met Petar Nizamov. The “refugee hunter” was arrested in April and placed under house arrest, as reported by Bulgarian media. The Bulgarian Attorney General Sotir Tsatsarov said at the time that it was not acceptable when groups or individuals took upon themselves the functions of state bodies and hunted refugees. There are several ongoing criminal proceedings against Nizamov. According to a report by
The Economist, he posted an amateur video in the spring to attract comrades. It shows how three refugees in the region of Malko Tornovo were brutally bound with cable ties. The refugees allegedly reported to police that the troop had threatened them with a pistol and knives, in addition to searching for money and valuables, according to the British paper.
The ex-frontwoman of Pegida, who recently was expelled from the leadership of the anti-Islam movement in a dispute with Lutz Bachman, posted pictures on Facebook and extensive reports of her Bulgarian excursion. She herself is wearing a camouflage suit on the pictures; some of the men of the vigilante group are disguised. In front of the public in Leipzig — there are about 300 people in the Plaza — she explains: “Should I trip through the bush in a pink T-shirt and high-heeled sandals?”
[0.21 minutes| Pegida founder Bachman sentenced for incitement]
Whether Festerling’s call to join the paramilitary vigilantes in Bulgaria will have legal consequences remains undetermined. In the Criminal Code, Paragraph 109h reads: “Whoever recruits a German to military service in a military or military-like establishment for the benefit of a foreign power will be penalized with a term of imprisonment of three months to five years.” Even an attempt to do so is a criminal offence.
@MatthiasMeisner
[Propaganda pictures of the paramilitary vigilante group from #Bulgarien, with which Tatjana #Festerling allied herself. 2:23 p.m. — 3 July 2016]
As described by the former AfD politician from Hamburg, the operations are covered by the law. “Bulgarian volunteers” would “track down illegals in a completely legal manner and without weapons and hand them over to the border police,” Festerling said in Leipzig. However, videos posted on the internet by the troop itself show fighters with guns and also doing target practice. The FAZ reports that the vigilante group appeals on its internet page to all compatriots to protect the southern border of Bulgaria and the fatherland and to free the world “from the slavery of the Zionist international financial mafia.”