On Saturday 17.07. more than 200 demonstrators gathered in Duisburg Hautbahnhof and moved to the working-class neighborhood Hochfeld. Reason are the attacks of the police at the "Versammlungsgesetz stoppen" demonstration from 26.06 in Düsseldorf.

More than 6,000 demonstrators marched through Dusseldorf and spoke out against the assembly law which was planned to be passed by the black-yellow state government. The law provides for a drastic tightening of the right of assembly. More details on the content of the law can be found in the issue 40. of the Red Post.

In the course of the demonstration there were repeated attacks by the cops. Their targets were the anti-fascist block, as well as the anti-capitalist-internationalist block. In the course of the attacks with massive use of batons and pepper spray, more than 100 demo participants were injured. Among the injured are also at least two journalists. A DPA journalist reported that he was attacked by two cops with batons. To push their attacks on the assembly even further, the cops decided that the anti-fascist block was no longer part of the demonstration and thus no longer falls under the right of assembly. With this action, the cops have shown that they do not care about the rights and laws and they can suspend them at any time if they want. The cops surrounded the block and controlled the participants. With high temperatures, the denial of drinking water and sanitary facilities, the participants were held for hours. The justification for this brutal action was that participants of the block had masked themselves. Demonstrators who were arrested were denied access to paramedics and lawyers and were at the mercy of the cops. How far the terror of the cops went can be seen by the liability of a demonstration participant. The cops dragged four of them into an underground car park and abused them with punches and kicks before they took him away.

The whole bull terror was made possible by an immense posse of cops. The city was occupied by helicopters, horseback squadrons, water cannons, and several squads of hundreds. The demonstration, especially the Antifa block, was accompanied the whole time by a huge contingent of cops. But despite the immense contingent, the participants of the demonstration did not let themselves be defeated and fought off the brutal attacks of the cops to a large extent. Thus, it came to participants of the demonstration with flagpoles, construction site barriers or even with bare hands against the cops to defend themselves. A video of the attack of the cops can be seen here.

Driven by the anger at these attacks, the demonstration moved through Duisburg in a militant manner. Especially in Hochfeld, residents showed solidarity and partially joined the demonstration.

A youth from the neighborhood on the question of how he stands to the police

The alliance "Stop the Assembly Act" is not intimidated by the attacks and is planning the next large demonstration in Düsseldorf for August 28.