In all of it’s history, Paragraph 129 is use to persecute the freedom of speech in Germany. What began in 1822 as a “state protection law” and was directed against the bourgeois revolution in Germany, was later used against democrats and socialists who wanted to create publicity for the Paris commune in 1871. In the 200 years of history, the name changed, but the content always remained the same: anyone who opposes the status quo will be punished for it. Paragraph 129 StGB was used massively in Nazi Germany between 1933-1945 and all regime critics, opposition members and resistance members were charged under this paragraph. When Nazi Germany was defeated, West Germany reviewed the penal code in 1951 in the course of the so-called “denazification”. Paragraph 129 was also to be deleted from the code. But West Germany, where 80% of judges also served as judges in the Nazi regime, kept Paragraph 129 in the code to prevent “Nazis from gaining strength again.” However, in 71 years since that decision, Nazis have rarely been tried. Instead, mainly anti-fascists, anarchists, democrats, and socialists are the ones, who have been tried.
All of these groups were accused of terrorism, especially after the intensification of the attacks against the people of the world by USA in the framework of post 9/11 concept of “War on Terror”. Those who spread terror all over the world cannot determine who is a terrorist and who is not. Paragraph 129, as an attack on rights and freedoms as well as on the right of resistance, is nothing more that legal injustice. It must therefore be removed from the law without exception. This is in the interest of all the people in Germany, first and foremost of all democrats and socialists. Thus, we call on all the people in Germany to fight against sections 129, 129a and 129b. Let us unite to banish thes anti-democratic, fascist paragraphs once and for all in the history. Even though today socialists from Turkey and Kurdistan are the main targets of these attacks, section 129 is historically an attack on all democrats in Germany. The democratic struggle in Germany has been attacked and criminalized through this paragraph to such an extent, that nowadays anti-fascism hardly takes place both among the population and in the streets. The people in Germany know from their history what fascism means. They know it from the massacres, the executions and the concentration camps. The people in Germany, above all the anti-fascists, anarchists, democrats, and socialists will hence not further tolerate that a Nazi law continues to be applied to protect fascism from German ground worldwide.
We therefore call on all the democratic institutions, organisations, associations, parties and individuals to act against the nazi paragraphs 129, as well as 129a and 129b! Who does not actively oppose fascism becomes easily accomplices. Therefore: do not be accomplices, but the barricades against fascism!