2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany
During the 2015–2016 celebrations of New Year's Eve in Germany, approximately 1,200 women were reported to have been sexually assaulted, especially in the city of Cologne. In many of the incidents, while these women were in public spaces, they were surrounded and assaulted by large groups of men who were identified by officials as Arab or North African men. The Federal Criminal Police Office confirmed in July 2016 that 1,200 women had been sexually assaulted on that night.
| 2015–16 New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany | |
|---|---|
| Part of the European migrant crisis | |
Most of the assaults in Cologne took place on the plaza between central railway station (left) and cathedral. | |
Number of women sexually assaulted:
Cologne: around 650 Number of perpetrators: over 2,000 | |
| Location | Germany |
| Date | 31 December 2015–1 January 2016 (CET) |
By 4 January 2016, German media reports stated that, in Cologne, the perpetrators had mostly been described by the victims and witnesses as being "North African", "Arab", "dark-skinned", and "foreign". On 5 January 2016, the German government and the Cologne police speculated that the attacks might have been organized. However, by 21 January, the government of North Rhine-Westphalia declared that there were no indications of premeditated organized attacks, and on 11 February, the new Cologne police chief stated the same. Instead, the Cologne police chief suggested that the perpetrators had come from countries where such sexual assaults by groups of men against women are common. That suggestion was confirmed in a Federal Criminal Police Office report in June 2016, which also identified five more factors contributing to the occurrence of the attacks: group pressure, absence of police intervention, frustrations of migrants, disinhibition caused by alcohol and/or drug use, and disinhibition due to lack of social ties with indigenous German society.
By April 2016, statistics recorded by authorities indicated that out of the identified 153 suspects in Cologne who were convicted of sexual offenses and other crimes on New Year's Eve, two-thirds were originally from Morocco or Algeria, 44% were asylum-seekers, another 12% were likely to have been in Germany illegally, and 3% were underaged unaccompanied refugees. By July 2016, the police stated that half of the 120 identified suspects of sexual offenses on New Year's Eve had arrived in Germany during the year 2015, and most of those 120 had come from North Africa, with four suspects having been convicted nationwide. By November 2016, around 200 suspects of the sexual assaults had been identified across Germany.